David Drazin – Piano Accompaniment for Silent Films

David Drazin – Accompanying Film Treasures

Terrence Flamm

Musician David Drazin felt his first urge to play music along with a silent film as a teenager back around 1973 when The Mark Of Zorro was being shown at a neighborhood library. He already belonged to an Old Time Radio Club at his high school and had a collection of 8mm Blackhawk Films. At the library, he spotted a piano right next to the screen.

“As the film was being shown silent I just dove in, though it was nerve-wracking,” Drazin recalled via a recent e-mail interview. “Once the action really got going I was okay.”

It would take a little over 10 years before Drazin would professionally play piano for silent films, starting with gigs at the School of the Art Institute Film Center. These days, he’s a respected silent film photoplay pianist, cited by Chicago Tribune critic Michael Phillips as, “one of the premier practitioners of his kind.” In addition to performing regularly at the Gene Siskel Film Center in downtown Chicago, Drazin has found work at venues like The Sunrise Theater of North Carolina, The Detroit Museum of Art, The New York Public Library, The Cleveland Cinematheque, and The Broncho Billy Film Festival in Niles, California. Drazin credits his wife Carol Seymour’s web-searching skills with putting him on the path to out-of-state gigs.

“I had managed to scrounge a few Chicago locations to accompany films, mainly the old School of the Art Institute Film Center. She used the computer to get me connected to the Columbus, Ohio Cinevent, and kept pushing for more opportunities.”

Drazin’s old-time profession got another high tech boost when he was recently invited by Tom Nastick at The National Archives in Washington, D.C. to play piano along with the Buster Keaton classic, The General. The film was being shown as part of a Civil War exhibit at the National Archives.

“He started searching websites looking for someone who had accompanied The General a lot,” Drazin said of Nastick. “Luckily, he found me. I’ve seen it and played for it more times than I ever imagined possible but never get tired of it.”

Throughout his years of experience, Drazin has often improvised the music he plays for a film, making it up as he watches the scenes unfold along with the audience. There have been times when he hasn’t even seen the film before sitting down to provide accompaniment for it.

“I played the first 10 years at the Art Institute without seeing a film before the show. Perhaps low self-esteem prevented me from imagining they would show a film just for me. On the other hand they had lots of pictures at that time. Sometimes three a week, so it wouldn’t have been totally practical to see them all first.”

Drazin added that in more recent years, he sometimes has been given “screeners” or advance copies on VHS or DVD to watch and use for practice. He still plays cold for films around 50% of the time.

“I like to say that I’m an improv guy who can read better than average,” Drazin explained.  “Sometimes I use ‘sketches’ of music or chord passages, lead sheets and on rare occasions, parts of scores.”

While The General is Drazin’s favorite silent film, he says he doesn’t really prefer any particular genre in terms of being an accompanist. Every performance presents an interesting challenge, whether it’s for a European surrealist film or an American production that emphasizes movie stars or favorite directors. Drazin said he felt “horribly jittery” the first time he played the Laurel & Hardy theme, “The Cuckoo Song” for a film. “I learned it from a cassette tape I got of T. Marvin Hatler (the composer), who explained it while playing it. Some fans are totally serious about their comedy, and I would have hated to choke on that one.”

One of his longest performances was when he accompanied four and a half hours of unedited takes of Que Viva Mexico, an unfinished film by Sergei Eisenstein. He also accompanied all 10 chapters of a serial called Les Vampires, which amounted to nine and a half hours of playing, with a dinner break in the middle. Drazin confirmed his hands were pretty tired after that gig.

He feels it’s wonderful that silent movies are being shown nowadays much more often than ever, but concedes it’s a hard sell to get people actually go see them. Still, he believes viewing a silent film with an accompanist is a unique experience.

“Quite often, I get the impression that many people haven’t ever heard anyone play the piano right there in the room with them, and probably not for 90 minutes straight. Then after the initial shock, it’s maybe like dreaming while you’re awake.”

Visit David Drazin’s website at http://www.kendavies.net/daviddrazin/