CRAIG SAFAN: HORROR MACABRE VOLUME 2

Released in 1983, NIGHTMARES had its origins in a short-lived weekly television series titled DARKROOM on ABC hosted by James Coburn in which two horrific tales unfolded back-to-back within its hour-long time slot. The show was conceived in the vein of other short horror-thriller programs such as ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS, THE TWILIGHT ZONE, THRILLER, THE OUTER LIMITS, and NIGHT GALLERY.

In the year following the success of DARKROOM, rival network NBC moved to capitalize on anthology storytelling by commissioning Christopher Crowe and Jeffrey Bloom, who had written and directed a handful of episodes of DARKROOM, to write four short scripts to be assembled into a two-hour unnamed pilot directed by Joseph Sargent. Bolstered by distinguished acting talent including Emilio Estevez, Lance Henriksen, Christina Raines, William Sanderson, Veronica Cartwright, and Richard Masur, the completed pilot demonstrated genuine potential for the network. However, there was a small problem. The executives at NBC deemed the episodes too intense for television audiences. The television pilot was summarily scrapped in favor of resurrecting the anthology as a theatrical motion picture called NIGHTMARES released by Universal Pictures.

The music for NIGHTMARES was composed by Craig Safan, who had also composed most of the episodic music for DARKROOM. Safan had already made a name for himself scoring THE GREAT TEXAS DYNAMITE CHASE and FADE TO BLACK and would further his career by authoring beloved scores for THE LAST STARFIGHTER, REMO WILLIAMS: THE ADVENTURE BEGINS, THE LEGEND OF BILLIE JEAN and all two-hundred and seventy-one episodes of the hit television series CHEERS. Safan had just come off a particularly heartbreaking project when his entire score for WOLFEN was rejected and replaced by a score from another composer. Safan’s music for NIGHTMARES is a calculated blend of aleatoric orchestral music coupled with a heavy dose of synthesizers during one of the film’s most memorable segments.

SEDUCED BY MADNESS aired on the NBC network in 1996, presented in two episodes and starred the legendary Ann-Margret along with Peter Coyote, Leslie Hope, Christian Campbell, Hedy Burress, Tobey Maguire, Freddy Rodriguez, Cliff De Young, Dean Norris, Tomas Arana and Kurt Fuller. Ann-Margret plays Diane Kay Borchardt, a Wisconsin teacher’s aide convicted of hiring her students to spy on and eventually kill her estranged husband. SEDUCED BY MADNESS dramatizes the events leading to Borchardt’s conviction, life in prison without the possibility of parole until she has served forty-five years in prison. For SEDUCED BY MADNESS, Safan composed a chamber score—comprised primarily of strings, winds, and percussion.

Emmy-nominated and eight-time ASCAP award-winning composer Craig Safan has scored more than one hundred feature films, television and documentaries, has had more than 50 soundtrack albums of his music produced, as well as having three original albums of his own impressionistic music released. He’s been commissioned to compose for ballet as well as for live performance of silent films and was given the Poledouris Film Music Legend Award at the 2014 International Film Music Festival in Cordoba, Spain.

Dragon’s Domain Records presents CRAIG SAFAN: HORROR MACABRE VOLUME 2, featuring the premiere release of his music for NIGHTMARES and SEDUCED BY MADNESS: THE DIANE BORCHARDT STORY on compact disc, featuring Craig Safan’s music mastered by James Nelson of Digital Outland. The booklet contains liner notes written by author and composer Brian Satterwhite and includes comments from the composer.