Oscar-Night Music Is Still, in a Sense, Lingering in the Air

David Was’ childish and vitriolic personal attack on Ian Fraser was uncalled-for, and The Times should be ashamed for running it (“Defending Oscar Music,” Counterpunch Letters, April 10). Ian Fraser is one of the most successful, professional, talented and classy people in our business. His opinions about the music direction of the Oscars deserve respect because he is one of a handful of people on the planet who actually has been music director of the Oscars.

Was makes no attempt to dispute Fraser’s opinions. He simply attacks his age and taste in music, and then, unaccountably, does the same to Mitch Miller. I’m sure we could find musicians younger than Was who find his music hopelessly outdated as well, but any such debates between generations about what is “Squaresville” and what is “contemporary” are beside the point.

David Was ignores the relevant question, which is, was Don Was a good choice to serve as co-music director of the Oscars with Burt Bacharach--who, by the way, is 71? Not the Grammy Awards, or the MTV Awards, but the Oscars. Traditionally, this role has gone to an Oscar-caliber composer-conductor who conducts the telecast and supervises and coordinates all of the music on the show. Clearly, Burt’s role was limited to the overture and the famous Oscar songs medley, both of which he composed and/or arranged, and conducted.

The fact is that Don’s ensemble was deemed to be an inappropriate choice for both the Billy Crystal medley and the “Blame Canada” song, arguably the musical highlights of the show. Was neither arranged nor orchestrated these numbers, and, in fact, Pete Anthony, an experienced composer-conductor, was brought in to conduct the large conventional orchestra required to replace Was’ ensemble. We can only speculate why Was did not conduct the orchestra, which of course is the principal duty of the music director during the telecast. The four other best song entries were performed by the artists who performed them in their respective films.

Then the question becomes, what did Don do? Apparently, at least as far as the home audience was concerned, only the various entrances and exits--to use Don’s phrase, the “incidental music.” These cues were as poorly balanced as any I have ever heard on television. One could blame the sound man, I suppose, but then why did the other musical numbers, as well as every other audio aspect of the telecast, sound perfectly fine?

It may be unfair to blame Don Was for an unfortunate and ill-advised decision made by the producers of the Oscar telecast. However, to attack Ian Fraser in such a puerile fashion for simply pointing out the sorry results of this bad decision is rather pathetic. It would have been nice if The Times had someone on staff who understood both the concept of music direction in live television, and the dynamics of this particular situation, and simply deposited David Was’ immature and biased diatribe in the trash can.

BRUCE BABCOCK

Via e-mail

Having read Ian Fraser’s insightful analysis of Don Was’ Oscar night contribution, I was mildly amused at David Was’ minor key response. It seems that Was holds out Fraser to be old-fashioned, seeing a shrink and needing a job. Nowhere does David Was respond to any of the points that Fraser made, but a good debater should have the intelligence to do that.

Additionally, I don’t know who Ian Fraser has worked with over the years, but winning 11 Emmys seems a hell of a lot more impressive than working, as Don Was has, with “Bonnie Raitt and the Rolling Stones and countless others.” (It really is the “countless others” that gets my attention.)

Two final points: Was Don Was only capable of getting a relative (what else should one think?) to defend his musical honor? And if Don Was is so talented, let him take on one of those old-fashioned guys like Mozart and let’s see how they compare. Can you dig it, Daddy-O?

STEPHEN KABAK

Sherman Oaks

Editor’s note: We asked David Was to respond to the charge of nepotism:

Not that I would mind sharing DNA with such an illustrious line as Don’s, but the name Was, alas, is an invention that he came up with when we were trying to name our band. Don’s then-toddler was in the stage of mental development Piaget called “reversibility thinking,” and was spouting phrases like “blue . . . not blue,” “hot . . . not hot.” His father plugged the word “was” into the equation and got: Was (Not Was), a mock-Sartrean bit of absurdist word-salad that somehow seemed to fit our world view.

Don and I do share a tribal affinity for ample proboscises and wacky hair, but the genetic resemblance ends there. Unless, following Shakespeare, we admit that none of us really know who our fathers are, in which case I accuse the accuser: Could it be you are fraternal to Fraser? Physician, heal thyself!

DAVID WAS

Tarzana