THE BEAR'S TALE op.510a (March 1998)

A documentary film about the making of 'The Bear'
Published by: Sreen First
Commissioned by: Paul Madden for Screen First
Duration: 60 mins

Notes

A SONG FOR 'THE BEAR'

I wrote the song and the lyric [opus 509] 'Somewhere a star shines for everyone' [/ opus] for [opus 496] THE BEAR [/ opus] and thought about who could sing it for the recording, set for 30th March at Whitfield Street. It was to be sung first as Tilly skates down the frozen Thames accompanied by the Star-Bear from the skies and the Polar-Bear from the North Pole, which was a delightful idea for a setting.

We needed a girl singer to record it and I rang Roxy Bellamy at Sony Classical. She said: 'We've just signed a 12-year old girl called  Charlotte Church. We'll send a demo over.'  Chris Black, her initial producer at Sony, was so excited that he evidently ran all the way from Gt. Marlborough St. to Goodge Street, clutching a video of his prodigy in his hand. We were sitting outside in the sun having lunch and he puffed up to us screaming 'You must see her, you must watch this!'  We went up to the office and decided to take her on. She recorded the song beautifully, at the same time becoming the star of a one-hour documentary on the making of the film made by 'Screen First' and called [opus 510a] 'The Bear's Tale' [/ opus], produced and directed by Paul Madden, the commissioning editor for Channel 4, as he had also been on 'The Snowman' and 'Granpa'.


Related Works


'*THE BEAR' op.496 (March 1998)
Songs and score for an animated film made for Channel 4 featuring the song 'Somewhere a star shines for everyone', sung on the film by 'discovery' Charlotte Church.
'THE BEAR CONCERT VERSION to be narrated or performed with projected film, girl soprano, tenor and baritone soloists and orchestra' op.510 (April 1999)
The music and songs comprising this concert work were originally created for the animated film of 1999

Related Autobiography Chapters


THE BEAR - 'SOMEWHERE A STAR SHINES FOR EVERYONE' - CHARLOTTE CHURCH (1997)

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