On 24 and 26 January Nürnberger Symphoniker conducted by Adrian Prabava performed Carl Davis’ score for Rupert Julian’s film adaptation of The Phantom of the Opera at the city’s Kongresshalle. The 1925 silent movie, based on Gaston Leroux’s 1911 novel, tells the story of a disfigured, obsessive musical genius who haunts the Paris opera, mesmerised by young soprano Christine.

The 93-minute score for large orchestra encourages a sympathetic understanding of the enigmatic Phantom, refusing to paint him as wholly evil, with Davis’ music underlining the complex nuances of Lon Chaney’s commanding performance. Davis’ score is interwoven with excerpts from Gounod’s Faust, the opera at the centre of the tale, to create the effect of overhearing the opera as if from a dressing room or backstage, following the movements of the camera around the theatre. The transcription of the famous ‘Jewel Song’ scene – during which the chandelier fatally crashes onto the prima donna – is ominously overlaid with percussion and climactically interrupted with a dissonant chord from the Phantom’s organ.

The acclaimed score premiered at the 1996 Edinburgh Film Festival and has since been performed over fifty times, including by the Hallé, Philharmonia Orchestra, and Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg, with Davis frequently conducting; in March 2024 it was presented by the Belgian National Orchestra and Frank Strobel at BOZAR.

The New Year saw another Davis film score performed in Germany, with the Deutsches Filmorchester Babelsberg present Ben-Hur at Postdam’s Nikolaisaal, conducted by Gottfried Rabl, on 25 January. The 141-minute score to Fred Niblo’s 1925 silent epic uses a vast orchestral palette with a Wagnerian sweep appropriate to the film’s sea battle and iconic chariot race.

Wagner’s influence on Davis’ score – orchestrated with assistance from Colin and David Matthews – is reflected in its system of descriptive leitmotifs, as well as references to the ‘Dresden Amen’ that Wagner used in Parsifal and the same opera’s ethereal prelude. Davis himself recorded Ben-Hur with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra in 2012, and it has received over 65 performances since its 1987 debut at the London Palladium, also conducted by the composer.