For him, a career in performing music for silent movies happened by accident. He summed the experience up in two words: chance and enthusiasm.
He was first discovered in 1969, during a sophomore prank screening of “Phantom of the Opera” during his time at IU.
James said in an email that he was soon discovered by NPR and featured on the nationally broadcast “All Things Considered.”
“That coverage immediately led to invitations throughout the Midwest for me to begin performing at colleges and in historic movie theaters,” he said. “I had the audacity to contact the number one silent film star, Lillian Gish, a few years later to attend one of our then-annual Bloomington campus IU Auditorium screenings ... and from that the world of film opened up to me from that point forward when I became her personal accompanist at celebratory silent film screenings nationwide for the next six years.”
James initially came to IU as a student with an interest in church organ music. However, his sophomore year concert signaled a change in his musical future.
Tomorrow, James will accompany the 1924 silent film “The Hands of Orlac.” The film tells the story of a man who, after an accident disfigures his hands, has the hands of a murderer transplanted onto his wrists. James said finding the original accompaniment of a film takes a lot of work.
To prepare for each performance, he said he initially views the film in its entirety to “get a sense of the whole work.” He then practices each scene with each unit of music to accomplish the transition to a solo performance. He said he also establishes a much more detailed sight cueing to assist with his ?performance.
If the film’s original score does not survive, he ?researches clues to the original performance characteristics. He also begins to assemble tentative choices of thematic materials from his own ?collection.
“I then view the film scene-by-scene and write up an emotion-guided reaction script to the film to serve as an outline guide for my score ?assembly,” James said.
For James, his favorite part of performing comes in two parts. First, he said it was about lending authenticity to the screening of a silent film.
“Silent film was about more than going to a movie,” he said. “It was about attending a fully realized theatrical experience. The films were intended from the beginning as live performance presentation entities (unlike the purely reproductive film experiences of today), to have live music to accompany them in performance, so I think of my screening accompaniments as fulfilling a prescribed role.”
Second, he said it makes him feel young again.
“I started doing this when I was 14 years old,” he said. “And now at age 64 I’m still doing it.”
