There’s a moment in the Billy Wilder classic “Sunset Boulevard” when Gloria Swanson, as a faded silent movie actress, remarks, “I am big. It’s the pictures that got small.”

Much the same could be said, setting aside the delusions of grandeur, of the great composers who worked during Hollywood’s golden age. It’s ironic that in the current era of vertiginous CGI that so many of our movies seem to lack dimension. There was a time when music with a strong profile was regarded as an essential element of the moviemaking process. It was a way of creating 3-D without the necessity of special glasses.

On May 14, the New Jersey Capital Philharmonic Orchestra will remind us of what’s been missing, to great extent, from the movie-going experience in recent years. The program “Cinematic Classics” will be presented at Patriots Theater in the Trenton War Memorial. Works by composers Miklós Rózsa, Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Bernard Herrmann and William Walton prove what can be achieved by a skilled musician with a gift for melody, an innate sense of drama, and good old-fashioned musical know-how.

For those of you who believe that they don’t make ‘em like they used to, this concert is highly recommendable. You can read more about it in my article in today’s Trenton Times:

http://www.nj.com/times-entertainment/index.ssf/2016/05/classical_music_njcp_performin_1.html