THE FOREIGN FILM THEME

"The Third Man Theme" 1949
Music written and performed by Anton Karas, based on a melody Karas found in a book of zither etudes. Director Carol Reed was looking for a sound that would evoke the atmosphere of Vienna but wasn't waltz music. He heard Anton Karas, a zither player, performing in a beer garden as Reed was scouting out locations for the film. He asked Karas to score and perform for the film's sountrack, and Karas agreed, though he had no experience beyond playing in beer and wine gardens. The zither was a new, catchy yet odd sound for English and American audiences and provided a perfect atmosphere for the film, which was very much the story of a stranger in a strange land. And the melody stayed with audiences, quickly becoming a popular request. Karas released the tune as a single, but Guy Lombardo's version, with a guitar playing the lead, was the best-selling. The Faber guide estimates over 40 million recordings of different covers of the song have been sold. "The Third Man Theme" may also take credit for winning an audience for film music on its own. Following its success, it became standard practice to seek out catchy tunes for movie themes and to release them as singles. And virtually every soundtrack compilation through the mid-50s included a version of "The Third Man Theme." One source claims that, collectively, over 40 million copies of different renditions of the tune have been sold. Check with your neighbor if you don't own one.
The fact that Anton Karas took his melody from a practice book may hold the secret to the popularity of this song. It's one of the few standards that, as far as I know, no one ever attempted to put words to--which means it was material solely for instrumentalists. But what do instrumentalists have to offer the listener? Either fairly faithful renditions of popular melodies (for those for whom "the words get in the way") or demonstrations of technical proficiency in performance or arrangement. "The Third Man Theme" offers both.