SOUNDTRACKS
Soundtracks are a lot more than movie music...

...or so I'm ready to argue as a 30 year devotee of this sorely under appreciated genre.  So, in an effort to do my part, each week
I'll be making recommendations of soundtracks current and vintage, make a fuss over long awaited soundtrack scores finally getting
a well deserved release, and in general, make some noise about this often overlooked category.  Beyond my long experience as a
listener and as a pianist and songwriter, both of which I've put to use in writing a quarterly soundtrack column for the
Chicago
Tribune, I can only offer my recommendations.  You'll discern my taste soon enough and upfront I'd like to make it clear that I'll
focus most heavily on SCORE soundtracks.  In the end, all criticism is subjective but if I can point a listener toward a little heard
soundtrack or strongly advise you to either ORDER IMMEDIATELY or SKIP ALTOGETHER, all the better.
Howard Shore has certainly written his shares of interesting scores.  Several decades of work
and long standing collaborations with independent film directors like David Cronenberg,
Martin Scorsese and Jonathan Demme have guaranteed that.  Among Shore's credits are
After Hours, Before and After, The Brood (one of his first), Philadelphia, and Silence of the Lambs
(which I swear contains a cue that's an indirect homage to Dominic Frontiere's music for an
episode of the original "Outer Limits").  

Shore's profile elevated dramatically when he began a collaboration with director Peter
Jackson on the
Lord of the Rings pictures, work that brought Shore a couple of Oscars.  But
that association abruptly came to an end in 2005 when Shore and Jackson parted company
in post production on
King Kong for reasons that haven't exactly been made clear.

Though Shore's fastidious scores for the
Rings pictures are certainly notable for their musical
scope, I've not returned to them nearly as much as often as his work on greatly lesser
known and more challenging musical fare like, say,
Naked Lunch (with its dissonant Ornette
Coleman jazz riffs) or the wacky sci-fi flavored music he wrote for
Ed Wood.

And Shore was born to write deeply unsettling, somber music that's just the ticket if you're a
director with the sensibilities of David Cronenberg or David Fincher.  I was recently flipping
channels and came upon Fincher's 1997 oddball thriller,
The Game and ended up watching
the film again.  I'd forgotten how much I enjoyed the premise of the movie (rich, life starved
zillionaire is shaken up by an incredibly elaborate game that he can't stop until he solves)
and Shore's accompanying score.  Rediscovering forgotten movie music is almost as much a
pleasure for me as the movie itself.  I'm immediately mad to have the soundtrack -- or
listen to it again if I've already got it.  

With
The Game, the standout piece is the forlorn piano theme written for the title character
who is haunted by the early suicide of his father.  This theme, called "Happy Birthday
Nicholas," (it's somewhat reminiscent of the "Sentimental Walk" cue Vladimir Cosma wrote
for the opera diva and her fan as they walked about a rain soaked Paris in
Diva) permeates
the film -- especially since the rest of the music pretty much consists of odd piano tinkles
against ominous strings.

Reviews of the score harped on the sameness of this approach but it's really just a case of
superb subtlety, something that Shore has excelled at time and again (listen to his all of a
piece
Silence of the Lambs score if you need another example).

Unfortunately,
The Game wasn't a hit and though the music got a release, it's now out of print
and once again not the easiest of discs to find.  But Amazon has several copies at
reasonable prices and you can preview all the tracks including the piano theme
HERE.  
Usually, the disc ends up in my rotation when Fall comes around.  The Autumn chill of
Shore's music seems perfectly suited to that season.


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Don't forget to check out previous soundtrack recommendations by visiting the
ARCHIVES


Next Week:  TBD though I promise to recommend something easily obtainable!
The soundtrack for The Game (the
cover of the import version
pictured above) isn't for all tastes
but offers quiet rewards for
discerning listeners -- not unlike
the movie the music was created
for.  
Howard Shore, the composer
of the score and his ubiquitous,
Edith Head meets Harry Potter
glasses, shown above.