: (Compilation) Veteran
listeners of film music have been trained through suffering and
agitation about the ill fates that await superior film scores on Oscar
night. Only once or twice a decade does the best score of the year truly
win the appropriate Academy Award, leaving arthouse or political
favorites to ride the popularity of their films to win the "Best Score"
trophy. This reality rings so very true when you open the liner notes of
a collection of Oscar-winning score performances and the frustrations
over the awkward list of champs is actually acknowledged. Such is the
case with "The Hollywood Sound," a Sony Classical compilation of Academy
winners performed by the famed London Symphony Orchestra and conducted
by everyone's favorite maestro, John Williams. It was not unusual for
similar compilations from the wand of Williams to be released in short
succession at the time; the composer's leadership of the Boston Pops (as
well his obvious success in writing as well) caused him to be a hot
commodity on the re-recording market. Most of the albums containing
these performances were similar in feel and sound, often repackaging the
same exact music and rearranging it for more profit. The difference with
"The Hollywood Sound" is that Williams conducted London's finest through
several themes not regularly heard on Williams' usual compilations. The
selection of "Best Score" winners provided here is, at the least, an
interesting and varied group of entries. Unfortunately, the choice of
representation, the presentation of the themes, and a few of the
performances themselves, all raise far more questions than the album
answers. If you're a total film music novice, without a single score in
your collection (but with a few famous themes in your head), would "The
Hollywood Sound" give you an adequate idea about the history of the
greatest film music? Of course not... The album never has a chance, and
that's why products like this always turn out to be marginally curious
and maybe enjoyable for a listen or two. But nothing more.
As with any compilation with John Williams at the helm,
you can expect his own themes to dominate the air. Whether this is the
man's ego speaking, or simply that his music really is that great,
hearing the same concert arrangements of
Jaws,
E.T., and
Star Wars over and over again is tiring. With this album recorded
in 1996, it's baffling why Williams wouldn't spice things up with a
performance of
Schindler's List. Also tiring on "The Hollywood
Sound" is the prevailing need to cater to the soft ears of the
mainstream population with geriatric performances from the collections
of John Barry and Alan Menken. Certainly, the universe must surely have
had its fill of the "John Dunbar Theme" from
Dances With Wolves,
and with the presence of the arguably more romantic
Out of Africa
on the same album, the later track was unnecessary. Or perhaps Williams
could have arranged the two pieces into one larger Barry love-fest...
not a difficult prospect given Barry's predictably static structures. If
Williams had wanted to stir up the crowd, a rousing performance of
Barry's
The Lion in Winter would have worked. As for Alan Menken,
you might have to forgive Sony and Williams for catering to the Disney
dominance of the time. Menken was right at the end of his reign in 1996
anyway, though, and a snippet from Hans Zimmer's
The Lion King
might have done nicely. Among the older cues, the wealth of recognition
is spread around a bit better. One Hitchcock, one classic fantasy, one
swashbuckler for fun, one epic, and few other notable tidbits are spread
around between Hollywood's most famous composers. The performances from
Lawrence of Arabia and
The Godfather Part II are well
done, though perhaps the most vivacious performance on the album is for
Erich Wolfgang Korngold's
Robin Hood. Still, the album is plagued
by a poor sequence that follows
Robin Hood with
Jaws (a
great performance there, however), among other problems. Not only is the
album not grouped by genre, but it isn't offered in chronological order;
there is simply no sense to the presentation on "The Hollywood Sound"
and it kills the album's listenability. For veteran collectors, some
individual performances might be of interest, but the album is aimed too
directly at the mainstream to do much good as a whole.
*** @Amazon.com: CD or
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