Hamlet – A Shakespeare Scenario (arr. Palmer)

Composer: WALTON, Sir William
  • Walton wrote the score for the 1948 film, Hamlet, starring Laurence Olivier. This film was not the first instance of a Shakespearean collaboration between Walton and Olivier. The two previously collaborated on As You Like It in 1936 and Henry V in 1944; in 1955 they would team up once more for Richard III.1
  • On a sad personal note – while writing Hamlet, Walton’s wife was terminally ill with cancer, which makes the music of the Threnody and Funeral March especially poignant.2
  • Christopher Palmer arranged Walton’s score as an independent work outside the film in the following progression:
    1. Prelude
    2. Fanfare / Soliloquy
    3. The Ghost
    4. Hamlet and Ophelia
    5. The Question / “To be or not to be”
    6. The Mousetrap
      • The Players
      • Entry of the Court
      • The Play
    7. Ophelia’s Death
    8. Retribution / Threnody
    9. Finale (Funeral March)3     

More background on the 1948 film, Hamlet

Synopsis for the Shakespeare play, Hamlet

Sources

  1. Byron Adams, “Walton, Sir William,” Grove Music Online (2001), accessed July 26, 2022, https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000040016.
  2. Christopher Palmer, “Hamlet,” in accompanying booklet, Walton: Hamlet / As You Like It performed by the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields conducted by Sir Neville Marriner, CHAN 8842, 1990, compact disc.
  3. Ibid.

Cut IDs

24615 20903