Robinson Crusoe: Haunted By The Theme Tune?

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ARE YOU HAUNTED BY THAT CRUSOE THEME TUNE?

by David West.

It is said that music be the food of love but to many people the sound of a particular piece of music is the food of nostalgia and reminiscing about the innocence of youth and childhood memories of long ago.

The piece of music I have in mind is that haunting theme tune used as the signature to “The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe” which was first broadcast by the BBC in October 1965 and repeated during many summer holidays until the contract ran out in 1981.

That highly orchestrated signature tune, with a definite upmarket beat, has stuck in the minds of thousands of people who even today are still searching for that very tune that brings back nostalgic memories of their long-lost youth.

Little do they know that there were two CD’s produced of the soundtrack, video tapes were made of the series and now there has been a DVD on sale for the past four years!

Little do they also know that the music score, and original prints of the black and white series only came to light during the late 1980’s after numerous searches, bought about by public demand, uncovered their existence almost by chance!

This internet site has received many hundreds of visitors who were looking for that particular piece of music and having found that it is still in the public domain, have ordered CD’s and DVD’s by the thousand.

But what is it that still makes people search so hard and long for that particular piece of music?

If you are over 50 years of age you will probably remember the beginnings of black and white television and the many children’s programmes with a theme of adventure and discovery, striving for success with initiative, and the use of imagination and creativity in solving problems encountered.

In those days this was what life was all about, survival, just like the life of Robinson Crusoe!

If we were bored then we found something to do!! We didn't just sit around and say "Here I am, entertain me", we actually got up and did something using our own initiative. We were creative and developed our imaginations, we went exploring and learned about the world around us in safety. We always had plenty of things to do. And so this older generation produced some of the best risk-taking problem-solvers and inventors ever!!

We did not have Play stations, Nintendo's, X-boxes, video games, nor hundreds of channels on the TV, no cellphones, mobiles, personal computers, no internet or chat rooms, no CD's, DVD's, movies, MP3 players, but we had many FRIENDS; and if not, we went out and found some.

We played out those scenes from “The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe” with our friends; and the music’s composers, Robert Mellin and Gian-Piero Reverberi, cleverly wrote a score that reflected the scenes involved and in so doing those pieces of music stuck in our minds, not least of all that haunting theme tune.

Creativity has long gone from our lives today, we are continually being bombarded with entertainment, and our brains are becoming ‘lazy’ and we all want people to do things for us.

Searching for that haunting theme tune over many years can be likened to our searching for times long gone by when life was a lot simpler and less complicated than it is today, even if it was rather harder.

It’s not just nostalgia we are after but a better way of life from long gone days and that wonderful theme tune from “The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe” reminds us just how far modern day technology has removed us from the realities of a simpler, non-technological, life.

Maybe that’s why so many people today are continuing to search for that wonderfully endearing and hauntingly popular theme tune.

22nd January 2011