Restoration by James Newton Howard

Restoration is a Period Drama released in 1995 with an excellent score from James Newton Howard which deserves a closer look. Not only has the composer captured the period feel and blended beautifully with music by Henry Purcell, but he also heightens the film's dramatic flow to great effect. More...

Piano music - as heard by Brahms!

Brahms was an excellent pianist, and a number of the pianos he used are preserved in museums. This double album consists of a number of Brahms' piano pieces played on the same instruments which he used. So we can hear his music as Brahms himself would have heard it. Jeffrey Dane's review of these recordings highlights the historical context of the pianos featured and, with a number of photographs, brings to life the history and the personality of the composer More...

Franz Waxman by Jeffrey Dane

In the early days of Hollywood, many film scores were written by conservatory trained composers from Europe. They may have been tempted by the financial rewards of a career in film music, or in some cases they were looking to escape from the troubles brewing in 1930s Europe. Franz Waxman was one of those immigrants who became a very successful composer in his adopted country. Jeffrey Dane gives us an overview of this remarkable man with some very revealing insights. More...

"Waltz with Bashir" by Max Richter

Waltz with Bashir is a wonderfully warm, romantic, but also harrowing film by Ari Folman. Equally the soundtrack is a very moving piece of work by composer Max Richter which complements the film perfectly. With this score the composer has finally obtained proper worldwide exposure, winning the hearts of music critics and musicians around the globe. The score was nominated for an Annie Award for Best Music in an Animated Feature and, most importantly, won the European Film Awards for Best Composer in 2008. More...

Classical Music
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Star Trek: The Music

With a new Star Trek movie hitting theatres soon, we take a look at the music of Star Trek. Over the past 40-plus years, the Star Trek Universe has brought us 11 major movies and 5 television series (not to mention the animated series, video games and some song singles), and that is a lot of music! Many composers have played a part in creating this music. In the "Star Trek" movies, Jerry Goldsmith has dominated, with James Horner, Leonard Rosenman, Cliff Eidelman, and Dennis McCarthy providing very able support. The Television Series have employed many more composers with Dennis McCarthy and Jay Chattaway playing major roles, following in the footsteps of the father of Star Trek music Alexander Courage who started it all off in 1966. More...

Laurie Johnson: The New Avengers

Laurie Johnson is most famous for his music for cult television series. He created themes for Animal Magic, This is Your Life and Wicker's World, but it is series like The Avengers and The Professionals which achieved cult status. Having been in the business for 50 years, the composer is steadily releasing his back catalogue in a series of triple albums. The first was called "The Avengers", the second was "The Professionals" and now the third set The New Avengers has been released. Disc 1 from this set contains music from 3 complete episodes and several other themes and cues from "The New Avengers", while discs 2 and 3 contain respectively, music from two of his stage musicals and various tracks from film, television and big band jazz arrangements. More...

Dance of the Dead by Kristopher Carter

Kristopher Carter is best known for his musical contribution to various animated television series about superheroes, such as "The New Superman Adventures", "The Justice League", "Teen Titans" and "Batman Beyond". However he has also scored a number of films including the recent Dance of the Dead. This is a teen zombie flick, which has given Carter the opportunity to provide a varied range of musical cues from dark suspense through several shock/horror moments and some heroic action elements. These are all well executed and surely show that the composer has a promising future in film. More...

Humboldt County by iZLER

It's awards season again where the focus will no doubt be on the past year's big budget movies and stars. But away from the major studios it's good to know that there are many independent film-makers who are turning out good films on a minimal budget. Independent films can be a great training ground for many film professionals including composers. We take a look at the soundtrack to Humboldt County by the composer iZLER. Could this be a name we will hear much more about in future, possibly during awards season? More...

Requiem for a Dream by Clint Mansell

Requiem for a Dream is composer Clint Mansell's Magnum Opus. It won the Online Film Critics Society Award in 2001 for Best Original Score and should have won a whole lot more. But perhaps this was a slow burner - it was only when the music was picked up and used elsewhere that people started to recognise it and respond to it. And it has been reused many times including the trailer for "Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers". We now review the original soundtrack. When music is made to perfectly match a film as intense as Requiem for a Dream, you know you are in for quite a surreal experience. More...

Silence, Night & Dreams - Preisner

A unique concert called Silence, Night & Dreams will be held in London's Barbican Centre on December 2nd. This features the UK Premiere of the latest composition by Polish composer Zbigniew Preisner. This is a large scale work for orchestra, chorus and soloists, and the composer will conduct the London Symphony Orchestra with the Crouch End Festival Chorus and soloists led by special guest Teresa Salgueiro. The programme also includes music from "The Double Life of Veronique" and the "Three Colours" trilogy, films which the composer scored for the late Polish director Krzysztof Kieslowski. More...

Vic Mizzy (1916-2009)

We sadly report the passing of composer Vic Mizzy. Though most famous for the iconic themes to the TV programmes "The Addams Family" and "Green Acres", his career was much broader than this. His early career saw several chart hits as a song-writer, before he made the transition into television and film music. A common feature of his music seemed to characterise the man himself - full of good-natured humour. We have collected the best examples of his work on youtube. More...

Ryuichi Sakamoto

As a film composer Ryuichi Sakamoto is probably best known for two exceptional scores, and curiously he starred in both films. In "Merry Christmas Mr.Lawrence" in 1983 he played the onscreen part of Capt. Yonoi and 4 years later in "The Last Emperor" he played the role of Amakasu. Though both scores used a wide instrumental mix, the earlier film concentrated more on synthesiser sounds, while in the later film (for which he shared the best score oscar) Sakamoto concentrated on the orchestral tracks while David Byrne and Cong Su provided most of the traditional Chinese music. More...

Grieg Piano Concerto - making history

This album is a modern recording using the latest techniques, though the performances were laid down a century ago! The Grieg Piano Concerto was recorded by Percy Grainger in 1921 on piano rolls which have been used to play a steinway concert grand and recreate the historic performance. Also included on the album are similar recordings of a number of solo piano works made by Edvard Grieg himself in 1906, and his Violin Sonata No.3 in Cm. It is remarkable to hear historic recordings with such clarity and definition More...

Ratatouille by Michael Giacchino

On paper, Ratatouille is a distinctly strange proposition even for an animated movie: a rat working in a kitchen who turns out to have talents as a gourmet chef! Yet the movie was by the same team who created "The Incredibles", and "Ratatouille" turned out to be equally entertaining and fun for all the family, winning many awards while composer Michael Giacchino rightfully received an oscar nomination for his contribution to the experience. The music is upbeat, wild, dizzy, spectacular and original, one of the best scores of 2007, and should be on the music lover's list. More...

Blade Runner 25th Anniversary

It is now 25 years since "Blade Runner" first hit our screens, and the movie and its music have had a remarkable impact on subsequent films and soundtracks. To mark the anniversary, director Ridley Scott has released his definitive version of the film called "The Final Cut", and composer Vangelis has released a 3 CD celebration of the music. CD1 of this Trilogy is the original soundtrack release, CD2 contains previously unreleased music from the film including some tracks which weren't used in the movie, and CD3 is all new material by Vangelis inspired by the music and mood of the Blade Runner score. Further details and a short interview with Vangelis can be found on our review page. More...

Beowulf - by Alan Silvestri

The film composer Alan Silvestri has long been associated with director Robert Zemeckis, having scored many of his films from the "Back to the Future" trilogy, "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" and "Forrest Gump" through to the more recent "Polar Express". Their latest film Beowulf uses the same Performance Capture process as "Polar Express" which essential turns a live action movie into a kind of computer animation with added special effects. Much of the music is definitely very "Macho" with loud drums and brass, with limited synth effects helping to establish the ancient mythical setting. However these moments and their associated main theme don't dominate the movie, and are well balanced by the mysterious seduction tracks and a couple of songs sung by Robin Wright-Penn in the movie. More...

Atonement - by Dario Marianelli

In some ways the music to Atonement is a return to the world of "Pride and Prejudice" for composer Dario Marianelli, with its piano theme taking central place and performed once again by French pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet. On closer inspection however, this is a very different soundtrack with greater emotional depth and a central duet between Thibaudet's Piano and the Cello of Caroline Dale. There are other solo moments for Clarinet, Oboe and even Harmonica but the score has some unusual tricks up its sleeve. In places it carefully blends underscore with some period choral music, but most unusual of all it features an old-fashioned typewriter as a musical instrument! More...

The Simpsons Movie - by Hans Zimmer

With his soundtrack to The Simpsons Movie, composer Hans Zimmer had a lot to live up to. The Simpsons TV series has always maintained a high reputation for its music, from its delightful theme tune by Danny Elfman to Alf Clausen's wonderful in-show music which over the years has brought us some cunning pastiches of just about every genre imaginable. There have also been numerous albums of collected songs from the series. So all these ingredients have been very carefully laid down as part of the Simpsons musical tradition and with his cinematic score, Zimmer has stuck very closely to this tradition while demonstrating his versatility. More...

The Queen - by Alexandre Desplat

French composer Alexandre Desplat, with a lot of soundtrack experience working on French and European films, has only recently turned to English language films in the Hollywood tradition. There he has been quietly building a new reputation for subtle or unusual film scores such as "Girl with a Pearl Earring", "Birth", "Hostage" and "Syriana". 2006 was his breakthrough year in terms of formal recognition, winning a Golden Globe for "The Painted Veil" and Academy nominations on both sides of the Atlantic for The Queen. Despite the story for "The Queen" covering affairs of state and the aftermath of a tragic death, manages to bring a certain lightness of touch and therefore warmth to the subject matter. More...

The Sea Hawk & Deception - Korngold

In the early days of the film industry Hollywood didn't have sufficient home-grown talent and sought to attract composers from Europe. The supreme example of this is Erich Wolfgang Korngold who had grown from a child prodigy to become a very successful classical composer in Vienna, before being tempted by work in Hollywood. This substantial release restores and recaptures two of the scores he created there in their entirety. "The Sea Hawk" and "Deception" are very different film scores but between them they demonstrate some of the very best film music ever created. This double album is the culmination of an enormous project and has been put together with great care and attention. More...

Notes on a Scandal - by Philip Glass

Alongside "The Illusionist", Notes on a Scandal was the second film soundtrack created by Philip Glass last year, and this one was to receive an Oscar nomination (the composer's third after "Kundun" and "The Hours"). Very much like "The Hours", "Notes on a Scandal" is an intense character-driven film whose music suggests the mental state of the main characters. In the CD's sleeve-notes, Glass tells us that he approached the score from the point of view of Barbara (the older teacher, played by Judi Dench). While the obvious scandal of the story concerns a younger teacher played by Cate Blanchett, the score begins and ends with the manipulative character of Barbara. More...