WithSeinfeldcurrently on astreaming hiatus, fans of the show might be wanting for lack of content related to the show about nothing. Fortunately, WaterTower Music will answer that call, releasing a soundtrack album from series composerJonathan Wolff. PerVariety, the 33-track album will feature the bass-slapping, finger-snapping theme, along with 40 more minutes of music from the series.
Wolff compiled the tracks from the nine seasons of the series, combing through 180 episodes to find scores that he felt were a good fit for the album:
“Was it the primary audio of a famous ‘Seinfeld’ scene? Did it contribute in a significant way to the comedy of the scene? And upon hearing it, will it serve as an instantly identifiable signature and bring warm fuzzies to a ‘Seinfeld’ fan who will remember that scene?”
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Wolff first got theSeinfeldgig through comedianGeorge Wallace, who is a good friend ofJerry Seinfeld’s, and with whom Wolff had worked for years in Las Vegas. Wallace recommended the composer after Seinfeld was unhappy with the original music used for the 1989 pilot episode. “His main concern was for the opening and closing credits, which were standup comedy,” Wolff recalled. “He would stand in front of the audience and tell jokes, they’d laugh, and he wanted music to go with it.”
Wolff suggested an unusual solution: building each episode’s theme around the featured standup segments. “It meant I was going to have to rebuild each piece of music for each monologue, to fit the timings and lengths, but that was OK with me,” Wolff explained. “It helped give a signature to the show.” He further devised a library of mouth sounds that he felt would fit with Seinfeld’s speaking voice, and a slap bass line designed to avoid the frequency range of his standup routine. The result was one of the most distinctive television themes in history, though one that didn’t garner immediate praise from NBC executives, who dismissed it as “weird, distracting and annoying.” Fortunately, co-creator and producerLarry Davidintervened. “Larry was deeply offended, and didn’t change anything,” Wolff recalled.
Of course, the soundtrack features much more than that theme. Wolff composed hours of incidental music for the series, including tracks like “Kramer’s Pimpwalk,” “Jerry the Mailman,” “Jerry vs. Newman Chase,” “Cable Guy vs. Kramer Chase,” “Kramer’s Boombox,” “Peterman in Burmese Jungle,” and “Waiting for the Verdict.” The album also includes some unused tracks, originally intended to be heard in the jazz club scenes from the season seven classic, “The Rye.”
Seinfeld: The Original Television Soundtrackwill be available starting July 2 on digital platforms.
