The Prince And The Pauper : 1937 (Film Score New Recordings)

Here is an astonishingly wide-ranging collection of some of the finest soundtrack music from across four decades and two continents, all performed by the National Philharmonic Orchestra under Charles Gerhardt. Actually, as far as purists are concerned, there may be a little too much John Williams here, although at least it's superb and lesser-known Williams, in the form of the short suite from The Reivers and an excerpt of his score for Jane Eyre. And most everything else here represents classic scoring at its undisputed best -- Miklos Rozsa's love theme from The Lost Weekend; Erich Wolfgang Korngold's piano-dominated theme material from Between Two Worlds plus his overture from The Constant Nymph, his love theme from Escape Me Never, and the music accompanying the flirtation scene from The Prince and the Pauper; George Antheil's ballet waltz from Spectre of the Rose; and Sir William Walton's suite from Olivier's Henry V. It's all superbly played and recorded, and marked the last work of producer George Korngold (Erich's son), to whose memory the collection was dedicated. The annotation is a little thin but it's difficult to criticize the overall quality of the release, which is one of the more successful compilations of its kind ever done in the film music field. ~ Bruce Eder|