Bond-tastic!

Photo courtesy of AMPAS website

On Friday night Larry took me to the Samuel Goldwyn Theater, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, on Wilshire Blvd. in Beverly Hills to attend "The Music of Bond:  The First 50 Years."  It was a wonderful evening, hosted by author, Jon Burlingame.  Friday was Global James Bond Day.  It has been exactly 50 years since the first James Bond movie, "Dr. No" was released.

The theater was packed.  Jon Burlingame  introduced musician, Vic Flick to perform the "James Bond Theme."  Mr. Flick is the original guitar player of this theme.  He brought the guitar that he played 50 years ago to re-create that recognizable theme for the audience.  It was energizing to hear it live and in person! I found the performance on You Tube....

The evening progressed with various film clips from Bond movies, usually the opening credits, highlighting the specific Bond music for each film.  We were treated with clips from "Dr. No" (1962), "From Russia with Love" (1963), "Goldfinger" (1964), "Thunderball" (1965), "You Only Live Twice" (1967), "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" (1969), "Diamonds are Forever" (1971), "Live and Let Die" (1973), "The Spy Who Loved me" (1977), "For Your Eyes Only" (1981), "Octopussy" (1983), "A View to a Kill" (1985), "License to Kill" (1989), "The World is Not Enough" (1999), "Die Another Day" (2002), "Casino Royale" (2006) and we even saw the opening credits to the latest James Bond film, with theme song by Adele, "Skyfall" (2012).   Musical giants, Don Black (lyricist), along with composer and conductor Bil Conti were there.   Both told great stories about the process of writing the music and some hilarious stories about many of the recording sessions.

Roger Moor in "A View to A Kill," Photo Courtesy AMPAS

Now, I want to go back and view ALL of the Bond films that I missed, just to hear the great music by John Barry and all of the other wonderful musicians who are associated with this long-lived franchise.

Sean Connery as James Bond (1962)

Larry @ the Goldwyn Theater