Soundtracks and Scores

While working on my Masters I had a course on film score analysis. We looked at scores from the 40’s into the 90’s. The best scores, in my opinion, were from the 50’s through the 60’s. There was a definite stylistic difference among composers of those periods and it’s striking to hear, and see, where many modern film score composers took their ideas from.
 
Alejo said:
Next one up is Joe Haishi, composer of the soundtracks for all the Studio Ghibli movies, and he has some really amazing ones as well.
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Been watching Studio Ghibli the past few weeks.

I found this channel in Youtube - Grissini Project.

These are my favorite renditions 💜



I hope they could make One Summer Day. 🤞
 
I have been listening to and collecting soundtracks since I was 8 or 9 years old. The first 2 soundtracks I ever heard were from the LOTR animated movie from 1978 (on 8 track!) and Star Trek The Motion Picture from 1979 on LP.

I have never understood why, but soundtracks somehow touch my deepest emotions/feelings- to the point of bringing me to tears sometimes. While many of the great soundtrack composers have already been listed here, there are a few that are missing that I found rather moving or powerful.

Here's a few I thought of to add to the list. Many of these are older, but some of these were the scores that made them big back in the day.

James Horner- Star Trek Wrath of Khan 1982 and Krull 1983.

Christopher Franke- Babylon 5 TV series 1992-1997. Christopher used to be the keyboardist for Tangerine Dream, who also happened to do the soundtrack for Tenchi the Movie- Tenchi Muyo in Love 1996.

Hans Zimmer- Man of Steel 2013, Inception 2010 , Interstellar 2014. He's already been mentioned, but everything he writes seems to be fantastic.

Shiro Sagisu- Neon Genesis Evangelion 1995 series + 5 later reboot movies.

Daft Punk- Tron Legacy 2010. If you've never heard this before, you'll probably be surprised at an electronic band's first and only soundtrack.

2001: A Space Odyssey, various composers

Toto- Dune (1984)

Johann Johannsson- Arrival 2016

Edward Shearmur- K-Pax 2001

I'm at work currently so these are just the ones I could think of. When I return home I'll look through my collection to see if there are any more that others might find interesting.
 
QuantumLogic said:
I have never understood why, but soundtracks somehow touch my deepest emotions/feelings- to the point of bringing me to tears sometimes. While many of the great soundtrack composers have already been listed here, there are a few that are missing that I found rather moving or powerful.
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I concur, and partly is because of the connection that we make to the stories, and how the music can bring us back to the moments that we first became acquainted with them. O perhaps it's a recognition of the principles that the stories have that resonated with us in some way. I think that the fact that the soundtrack is composed with a purpose in mind, that is then added as part of a whole, that is the music captures scenes and emotions and so on, adds a layer of connectivity that some other music might not have immediately.

QuantumLogic said:
Shiro Sagisu- Neon Genesis Evangelion 1995 series + 5 later reboot movies.
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Yes, this one is great, I personally tend to prefer the original series sound track.

 
And sorry for the double post, and even though this is technically Mozart as its composer, it is also the soundtrack to one of my favorite movies, Amadeus, and the pieces that they selected to score the movie were splendid!

 
This isn't a soundtrack, but moreso a musicological commentary on the Matrix soundtrack and the iconic sets of chords used by Don Davis throughout the film. This really elevated my appreciation for how harmony and dissonance can be used intelligently to construct the emotional tone of a scene or theme.

 
whitecoast said:
This isn't a soundtrack, but moreso a musicological commentary on the Matrix soundtrack and the iconic sets of chords used by Don Davis throughout the film. This really elevated my appreciation for how harmony and dissonance can be used intelligently to construct the emotional tone of a scene or theme.
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That was very nice indeed, the music was reflecting the dichotomy and contradiction that Neo was experiencing.
 
Alejo said:
Hi everyone,

After I posted this thread, I did a quick search on the forum to see if there was a thread for good scores and OST from movies or video games, and I realized that there wasn't one, so I figured I could start one.

I've always had a thing for scores in movies and video games, there's so many well composed tracks and themes that transport you to the scenes, and evoke the principles or concepts from a movie or series.

So, perhaps if anyone else has a similar appreciation for them, we can post our favorite soundtracks here?

I will start with this one, and I will add more as I have more time.

This one is composed by Keichi Okabe for a video game called Nier Automata, there's plenty of very nice tracks but these are two of my favorites.
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This is also notable in terms of Keigo Hoashi's compositions in that game, called "Forest Kingdom":

From the same house that developed Nier Automata, Platinum Games; this song from the failed game Babylon Fall (short story, I understand that Square Enix asked them for changes to make the game more compatible with the "Games as a Service" method, in the end the result was something that was too far from a pure action game focused on advanced mechanics as Platinum's usually are), the composition called "Dragoon's Pride" is in charge of the studio's own composers, in this case Hiroshi Yamaguchi:


Also from Yamaguchi this beautiful composition from Bayonetta 3, we are as one:


Of course, as for the rest of the themes, they are not far behind and are currently among the best on the market in the area of video game soundtracks, a couple more so as not to saturate this:


 
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Also worth mentioning is the music of SNK, who was a leading company in the field of video games during the 90s along with Capcom, before the bankruptcy of the year 2000, their arcade systems and sound cards were the most advanced during the time so they could produce more sounds than the competition, so it is not surprising that their musical compositions were more elaborate as well, they even used to release soundtracks arranged with real instruments from the original ost
"Blue Mary's Blues" from the game Fatal Fury Real Bout Special 1997:


The compositions used to be very varied in style as they are associated with different games and characters, such as these themes from different games in the Samurai Shodown saga where typical instruments such as Japanese flutes and shamisen abound mixed with more classical instruments such as electric guitars and tubas:


The URL is copied from the beginning of the track "Snow", although the rest of the album is just as good:



Of course there are "heavier" and more animated themes since SNK games are mostly fighting games with exceptions like Metal Slug:

 
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