Abstract. The article is devoted to an issue that seems to have a structural and technological rather than artistic nature. However, upon closer examination, it turns out that the minutes and seconds that make up the course of fi lm music can very seriously affect the overall drama of a fi lm as an action unfolding in time in terms of the ratio of fragments with musical arrangement and episodes without music. Especially when it comes to the work of such masters as D. Shostakovich.

Keywords: fi lm music, music in the frame, music out of the frame, coeffi cient of musical

sound, Shostakovich’s composition methods