The first film this evening introduces the nearly-forgotten figure of Hanns Eisler (1898-1962). Born in Leipzig to a mixed Jewish-Lutheran couple, Eisler and his family soon settled in Vienna where the boy’s musical training took root. After brief service in World War I, Eisler returned home to pursue study with Arnold Schoenberg, who was at that time the most famous composer in Vienna. He also formed a lasting friendship and collaboration with Berthold Brecht. Amidst the intellectual ferment, Eisler’s elder siblings became active members of the Austrian communist movement, which was seen as a viable counterweight to mounting fascist tendencies in European politics. This latter trend eventually forced Eisler into exile in 1935; his music, like Brecht’s writing, was banned by the Nazi Party.

After years of traveling, Eisler ended up in southern California alongside colleagues like Schoenberg, Rachmaninoff, and Stravinsky. Eisler produced numerous film scores, being twice nominated for an Academy Award. However, he was also among the first musicians to be blacklisted in the post-war McCarthyite hysteria. In a sad irony, Eisler’s own sister – now vehemently oppoed to the communist movement – testified against him to the notorious HUAC. Despite fundraising campaigns by Chaplin, Bernstein, and Copland, Eisler and his wife were deported in 1948. They resettled in East Germany, where Hanns continued to compose under Soviet censorship.

During his years of exile from Germany, Eisler composed music for an avant-garde silent film by the Dutch cinematographer Joris Ivens. Ivens enjoyed a privileged upbringing that allowed him time and resources to develop his interest in photography and film. He went on to become one of the most important documentary filmmakers of the 20th century, capturing political movements and world wars. But at the start his works like Regen (Rain) played a pivotal role in the new Dutch film style, one tied to constructivist trends in art. Regen is a short documentary “city symphony” filmed and premiered in 1929. The director’s purpose centers on capturing city images and fairly anonymous scenes of passersby as they navigate the stages of a rain storm in Amsterdam: from slow trickling drops at the start, through a building tempest and heavy downpour, to finish with a return to calm. Plot takes a distant back seat in Ivens’ aesthetic to considerations of shot composition, rhythm, and imagery; in brief, this is visual poetry. His experimental approach made Ivens popular in avant-garde film communities from France to the Soviet Union.

A decade after Ivens’ film appeared, the New School in New York City asked Eisler – then living in the city – to compose music to accompany Regen.  Eisler completed Vierzehn Arten den Regen zu beschreiben (Fourteen Ways to Describe the Rain) in late 1941. With this music Eisler paid a triple homage to Arnold Schoenberg, his revered teacher. First, he dedicated the score to Schoenberg. Second, Eisler intentionally scored Fourteen Ways for the same instruments used in Schoenberg’s pioneering Pierrot Lunaire: flute, clarinet, violin, viola, cello and piano.  Third, the entire thematic contents are based on a four-note anagram (A, E-flat, C, and B) presented at the start. In order to appreciate the significance of the anagram, readers must note that pitches are called by different names in the German system. Hence, Eisler’s motto pitches A, E-flat, C, and B in the American system translate to A, Es(=S), C, and H in German – i.e., the principal letters of Arnold SCHoenberg’s name.  Eisler builds fourteen variations or short episodes on this pitch motto.

One of the true giants of the silent film era was born in a small Midwest town in 1895. Joseph Frank Keaton grew up in the theatre, joining his parents comic Vaudeville act by age 3. As a child he learned the potential of physical comedy to delight audiences; he also learned to do it all with a deadpan expression that earned him the nickname “The Great Stone Face.” The use of stunts and facial expressions were, of course, absolutely integral to film acting before the voice could be captured during filming. The origin of his other nickname, Buster, is open to debate. A story runs that he got it after falling down a flight of stairs as a toddler, emerging unscathed. Whatever the truth may be, it is as Buster Keaton that Joseph acended to the very highest position in the burgeoning moving picture industry through the 1920s. His career later slid off the rails, but at his peak – in films like The General (1926) and Steamboat Bill, Jr (1928) – Keaton was the greatest actor-director working in Hollywood, bar none.

In 1924 Keaton produced Sherlock Jr, based on the great Arthur Conan Doyle character that had enjoyed such popularity in serial publications. The fantastical plot centers on a movie Projectionist, played by Keaton, who dreams of starting a side-hustle as a detective. His real-life love (aka The Girl, played by newcomer Kathryn McGuire) and his rival (The Sheik or Villain, played by Ward Crane) have their counterparts in a dream sequence, in which the Projectionist can live out his Holmesian fantasy. According to Keaton, his entire initial motivation for the film hinged on a sophisticated trick sequence in which the Projectionist walks through the empty cinema directly into the scene playing out on the silver screen. Sherlock Jr is filled with such cinematic spcial effects. Filiming and editing took twice as long as normal films, and the result is still highly regarded for its technical feats. However, public reaction was muted; critics, too, had mixed feelings about Sherlock Jr. Clearly it offered some captivating effects, but its comic punch failed to land as powerfully as his other films. As a curious footnote, look for Keaton’s reallife father in the role of The Girl’s Father.

Tonight’s screening presents a new musical score compiled by clarinetist Ed Matthew. Matthew spent years playing in Broadway pit orchestras while also working with the esteemed music publisher G. Schirmer in New York City. As such, he is eminently suited to cull through thousands of early 20th-century compositions to select music to accompany tonight’s screening. Ed adds the following thoughts about his process:

Assembling a score to accompany Sherlock Jr felt like creating incidental music for a play.  Unlike a stage production, though, music for a silent film lasts from overture until end credits and no music needs to fill time between instant scene changes.

During the era of silent films, music publishers hired composers to write photoplay music with “elastic scoring”: cues in the music let performers fill in any absent instruments.  The same selection could be played by one or two musicians in a small town’s venue – a pianist or organist – up to a big city’s grand theater orchestra.  A small ensemble occupies the pit at the theater where our “detective” works as a projectionist.  I settled on a sextet of woodwind, trumpet, two strings, percussion, and piano for the Buster Band: cinematic colors in a compact space.

Depending on a theater’s library, silent-film audiences heard different solutions to these puzzles: a) What to play? b) When to play it? and c) For how long?  After mapping scenes and durations, I arranged and orchestrated cues from several online theater archives including Library of Congress, University of North Texas, University of Colorado at Boulder, and IMSLP.  I highly recommend visiting the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra’s Photoplay Music Starter Kit on the web.

Each piece offers a descriptive title to match with a scene.  Sol Levy’s Dramatic Recitativo No. 1 (For Intensive and Heavy Dramatic Situations) is a perfect fit for Father’s missing watch as well as the mansion’s purloined jewels in Sherlock Jr.  Other evocative titles I chose include A Gruesome Tale, A Ticklish Tale, Enigma, and Simplicity.

Jason Stell and Ed Matthew, © 2025