Silent Film Sound

Rick Altman

Paper, 528 pages, 258 half-tones
ISBN: 978-0-231-11663-3
$30.00 / £17.50

January, 2005
Cloth, 528 pages, 258 half-tones
ISBN: 978-0-231-11662-6
$77.50 / £45.50

Part I: Methodology

1. The History of Silent Film Sound

Past Attempts to Write the History of Silent Film Sound

Assumptions and Limitations of the Current Project

2. Crisis Historiography

A New Kind of History

Anatomy of an Identity Crisis

Part II: The Late-Nineteenth-Century Soundscape

3. The Musical Scene

4. Lecture Logic

Part III: Early Film Sound

5. From Peep Show to Projection

6. Vaudeville

Part IV: Nickelodeon Sound

7. The Crisis of the Late Aughts

8. Lectures, Sound Effects, and the Itinerant Exhibition Model

9. Films That Talk

10. The Nickelodeon Program

11. Nickelodeon Music

Part V: The Campaign to Standardize Sound

12. Trade Press Discourse

13. Music for Films

14. Training Musicians, Training Audiences

Part VI: The Golden Era of Silent Film Music

15. Moving Picture Orchestras Come of Age

16. New Roles for Keyboard Instruments

17. Cue Sheets and Photoplay Music

18. Musical Practices

Conclusion

Related Subjects

• Film

Series

• Film and Culture Series

About the Author

Rick Altman is professor of cinema and comparative literature at the University of Iowa. He is the author of The American Film Musical and Film/Genre; the editor of Sound Theory Sound Practice; and the coeditor of The Sounds of Early Cinema.

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