Alumnus breaks silence on improv film career

By Paul Mayne

Bringing Haydn and Beethoven to life, in famed concert halls around the world, is nothing new for Bruce Vogt, BMus’73. You’d expect it, actually, from the classically trained pianist. But Vogt’s alter ego brings different classics to life – namely silent films on the silver screen.

This unique musical side began at Western thanks to a random request from an English professor wondering if the then second-year student would like to earn a few extra dollars.

“It was a summer course on silent film. Somebody heard I improvised and I knew one of the English faculty members who had heard me play jazz. They contacted me and asked if I’d be willing to play for this series of silent films they were going to be showing,” said Vogt, who has been a professor at the University of Victoria for 36 years.

That summer, he accompanied such classic silent films as Sergei Eisenstein’s Battleship Potemkin, D. W. Griffith’s Intolerance, Robert Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, as well as The General starring Buster Keaton and Gold Rush starring Charlie Chaplin.