Sinfonia of London - Jason and the Argonauts

Exciting, colorful and gigantic score for the fantasy film with special effects by Ray Harryhausen. Lengthy, spectacular re-recording features all of the music for Herrmann's various outlandish orchestral requirements, such as the huge brass section (including four tubas!) for the giant bronze statue Talos and multiple harps plus expanded woodwinds for the flying Harpies. Prepared from Herrmann's own original manuscripts and magnificently recorded in stunning detail. Bruce Broughton conducts the Sinfonia Of London. Product Description

Brilliant and no string attached (only harps and ancient string instruments)

Bernard Herrman has always created scores that produce strong visualization for the action on the screen. If you have seen Jason and the Argonauts the CD can be listened to independent of the film and it manifest in your imagination the scene in your mind. His music is so strong and that it works masterfully to create moods and feelings from the soundtrack as a seperate and independent enity. Bruce Broughton (Tomstone and Silverado sountrack) has done such a great job of bringing Jason and the Argonauts to life with dynamic, balanced and full prescene in this newer recording. It's just great.
Bernard Herrmann did not use a full orcrestra (with string section) when he wrote the soundtrack. He used only harps and some ancient string instruments. Herrmann was known for incorporating many ancient instruments in his film scores (one that is a good example is Journey to the Center of the Earth). If you are a fan of Bernard Herrmand or the film Jason and the Argonauts this is an exceptional work that becomes more intriguing and complex after repeated listenings. December 18, 2008

A masterpiece!

The only one way to have this motion picture score, re-recording conducted by Bruce Broughton, who has resurrected several motion pictures scores, and a specialist in Bernard Herrmann's music, performed by The Sinfonia of London. August 22, 2008

the best....

this is without question,the finest rerecording of any herrmann score-it seems to be the only one that the conductor and musicians actually listened to the original soundtrack to the film-and the fact that the original soundtrack session tapes no longer exist makes this beautiful recording that much more valuable-a must have!!! June 10, 2007

Excellent. Includes New Music!

I agree with the other reviews. The recorded sound here is outstanding, the musicians are excellent and the conductor Broughton comes close to the composer's own performance on the original soundtrack. There is even a beautiful new theme not heard in the film, used for the final moments of the film.

For me the opening credit's big theme is slightly dissappointing. As with Bernard's own later recording, this new performance slows down the tempo slightly and the result is a little more massive but with less forward drive. I prefer the original recording.

Otherwise I greatly enjoyed this performance of the score. The mysterious sound of brooding low woodwinds with harp are just right. Then for Mt. Olympus, the bright brass harmonies, again with harp are, well, heavenly!

For another great score I would add "The Ghost and Mrs. Muir" to the list. It is perhaps his most subtle score. January 31, 2005

The TRIO is complete!

Over a career of forty years or so, Bernard Herrmann composed some of the movies' best scores. There remain three that are must-haves for any fan of the composer, as well as fans of film music: "The Day the Earth Stood Still," a revolutionary score that influenced countless other films that followed it; "Psycho", a score unlike anything that preceded it, or for that manner, came after, and "Jason and the Argonauts," possibly the composer's finest work.

This recording, by Bruce Broughton and the Sinfonia of London, is a faithful rendering, with additional cues, of the masterful composition for the 1963 film. While the album in its entirety is a treasure, two cuts ("Hydra's Teeth/Skeleton/Attack" and "Scherzo Macabre") near the album's end are breathtakingly intricate and wondrously performed.

These young composers need to take a listen to this one. This is the way movie music SHOULD sound. December 1, 2002

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