Kenneth J. Alford - The Bridge On The River Kwai

There is some confusion about the march Colonel Bogey and its use in the film The Bridge on the River Kwai. While Sir Malcolm Arnold did use Colonel Bogey in his score for the film, it was only the first theme and a bit of the second theme of Colonel Bogey, whistled unaccompanied by the British prisoners several times as they marched into the prison camp, the whistled theme eventually supported by the first theme of Arnold’s original “River Kwai March”, the opening theme of which was based on the same chord progression as the first theme of Colonel Bogey. From that point on it was pure Arnold, though in the movie sequence the complete Arnold march was not heard.

Read more about this topic:  Kenneth J. Alford

Famous quotes containing the words bridge and/or river:

    “It launch’d forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself,
    Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.

    And you O my soul where you stand,
    Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,
    Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them,
    Till the bridge you will need be form’d, till the ductile anchor hold,
    Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O, my soul.”
    —Walt Whitman (1819–1892)

    “It is from quiet places like this all over the world that the forces accumulate which presently will overbear any attempt to accomplish evil on a large scale. Like the rivulets gathering into the river, and the river into the seas, there come from communities like this streams that fertilize the consciences of men, and it is the conscience of the world that we are trying to place upon the throne which others would usurp.”
    —Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)