The Special Edition of the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack to The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey contains the full score from the film with seven extended score cues, six exclusive bonus tracks, and deluxe liner notes packaged in a 2 CD hardcover digibook. The Soundtrack features original score by Academy Award winner Howard Shore recorded at famed Abbey Road Studios by the London Philharmonic Orchestra. Additionally it includes an original song, Song of the Lonely Mountain, written and performed by Neil Finn (Crowded House).
One of today’s most respected, honored, and active composers and music conductors, Howard Shore previously worked with director Peter Jackson on The Lord Of The Rings Trilogy, which stands as his most towering achievement to date. He won three Academy Awards for his music for those films.
$ 18.85
An Expected Journey,
I don’t know if there ever was film music, save for the sequels to the original 1977 Star Wars, that had as much anticipation attached to it as The Hobbit. Howard Shore created a milestone with Lord of the Rings, and despite the events surrounding Jackson’s King Kong, there was no question he would be on board for these films. It is quite possible, and very likely, given his passion for Tolkien, that he was playing with ideas for a possible Hobbit movie ever since he wrapped up The Return of the King.
Should you have asked yourself the question if themes from The Lord of the Rings would appear in The Hobbit, Howard Shore puts it to rest one minute into the album, when a plain string arrangement of the Shire theme appears in “My Dear Frodo”, leading into the prologue music after the opening titles. Here, much like in Fellowship of the Ring, several main thematic threads are introduced; the most prominent being the themes for Smaug and the dwarves.
Given the story of the films, it should be no surprise that Shore heavily expands upon the dwarven music from Lord of the Rings. “My Dear Frodo” and “An Ancient Enemy” are the most prominent examples, when the deep male chorus sings out earthshattering expansions of the dwarven harmonies, together with a new, noble theme on french horns for the great dwarf culture. While their theme in Lord of the Rings (“A Journey In The Dark”) was ever downward reaching, this theme moves upward in a proud, yet already slightly resigning way. This is a major thematic thread in this score, but of course not the only one. There are themes and motifs abound.
The centre of the score is twofold. One is the theme “Misty Mountains”, as already heard in the trailer. Written by Plan 9, it sets J.R.R. Tolkien’s poem to music, and is used in a great number of variations by Howard Shore, who often applies, appropriately, dwarvish orchestrations to it. “Over Hill” would be the most complete statement of that theme, and is a true powerhouse of movie music.
The other main identity is Bilbo’s theme(s), which can be heard in full form in “Dreaming of Bag-End” and “A Very Respectable Hobbit”. “Dreaming Of Bag-End” takes the idyllic, beautifully simple, tonal harmonies of the Shire music, and adds a simply sublime melody that achieves exactly what it should: it feels warmly familiar and is yet different, depicts Bilbo’s longing for his home perfectly, and sits comfortably amongst the classic Shire music from Lord of the Rings. It won’t take long until you feel like you always knew that theme. “A Very Respectable Hobbit” is sort of a variation on that, and is used to great effect for example in “The World Is Ahead”.
These two themes would be enough to warrant the waiting time for the score, but there is more. The opening music in “My Dear Frodo” reappears at the end of “A Good Omen”, acting as a wonderfully lyrical musical bookmark, to open and end the film.
There is a short but poignant motif for Gandalf, opening “Radagast the Brown”, followed by haunting boys’ choir, and a swirling theme for Radagast. The orcs of the Misty Mountains get a sound similar in tone to the orcs in Return of the King, but more mischievous, with lots of fluttertongue brass, and a short 3/6 notes motif. The 5/4 rhythm is back, constantly changing with 3/4 to create an absolutely exhilarating pace for “Under Hill” and “Brass Buttons”, the latter complete with deep male grunting, not unsimilar in style to “The Bridge Of Khazad-Dum”. There is also a characteristic short motif for the wargs. And quite a few themes are introduced here that would later become important in Lord of the Rings: Concerning Hobbits, Rivendell, Gollum’s themes, Sauron’s theme, some Mordor motifs, Nature’s theme for the eagles and also the History of the Ring theme, which gets some fantastic variations in “Riddles In The Dark”.
The special edition soundtrack also adds “A Very Respectable Hobbit”, “Erebor” and “The Dwarf Lords”, which are thematic presentations of those themes. These are certainly major highlights on the album, even if they are short. “Erebor” is as adventurous as adventure music gets, spine chilling. In general, the tone of An Unexpected Journey is thoroughly more lighthearted and spirited than any of the Lord of the Rings films, since The Hobbit is a more lighthearted movie, so don’t expect highly dramatic music like “The Breaking of the Fellowship”. Don’t be afraid, the music doesn’t skimp with emotional highlights in all its splendour, but it puts a smile on your face instead of leaving you an emotional wreck. Howard Shore adresses the lighter nature of the film. The Hobbit music is more bouncy, the chorus airier and there is an overall more “active” quality about the music, adding more flourishes.
The album includes “The Song Of The Lonely Mountain”, written and performed by Neill Finn, member of Plan 9. As brilliant as the score is, so dissapointing is this song. It is, to…
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|A Fitting Companion for Book and Movie,
In the middle of November 2012, I discovered that Decca Records was, for just a couple of days, streaming the complete “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” score on their web site. There was only one catch: For copyright reasons I couldn’t pause the music or skip tracks. Oh — and it’s one hour and forty-five minutes long.
To quote Bilbo in the film: “Fair enough!”
I dived right in and listened to the whole lot. As it happened, I was right in the middle of re-reading “The Hobbit”, and the movie isn’t out yet as I’m writing this. But that doesn’t matter. Good music should be able to stand on its own, and I think Howard Shore has pulled it off again with this epic film score.
Later I got more chances to stream the music at a more leisurely pace, and this time took some notes.
So, without benefit of having seen the film apart from a few snippets, here are my initial thoughts and impressions. I already have the CD on order. Even if I should never see the film at all, I will still love this music.
*** Potential spoiler alert ***
I’m assuming that you’re somewhat familiar with the plot of “The Hobbit” as you read this. I’ll try not to give too much away, and will hint at certain things, but consider yourself warned — I can’t keep everything secret.
Abbreviation key: LOTR = “The Lord of the Rings”; FOTR = “The Fellowship of the Ring”; TTT = “The Two Towers”.
01) My Dear Frodo (8:04)
The CD starts out with a pastoral sound, Shire music as in LOTR. Then, no doubt as an older Bilbo narrates or remembers events long past, the music takes on a more ominous military quality with drums and trumpets. There is a haunting chorus, leading into a Moria-like Polynesian choral chant.
Could this be a flashback of the Battle of Azanulbizar at the gates of the Mines of Moria? This, in the backstory, is where the Dwarves avenge the death of Thorin’s grandfather Thrór, and kill Azog the Goblin. It sets up the great enmity between Dwarves and Goblins (Orcs), so central to this movie trilogy’s plot, so would be a logical move on the part of the screenwriters.
But no, it seems this is the attack on Erebor instead. An interesting choice of music, in that case.
02) Old Friends (4:29)
This track starts out with more familiar Shire music. It’s easy to imagine Gandalf talking to Bilbo at Bag End. There is a snippet which in FOTR indicates Bilbo getting a bit flustered, so likely means the same here. Bilbo doesn’t like where the conversation is going. It smacks of Adventure, and decent Hobbits want nothing to do with that.
The music gets a bit more ominous towards the end.
03) An Unexpected Party (3:52)
I can just imagine Bilbo dealing with a bunch of Dwarves showing up on his doorstep by ones and twos and even in a heap all at once. Guess who’s coming to dinner?
There is a new, recurrent playful theme here that slowly picks up the pace as the guests arrive and the pressure mounts inexorably on the host.
04) Axe or Sword (5:59)
This track starts with one of the new themes, one that is already starting to sound familiar to me just from listening to the first track. I can imagine Bilbo, Gandalf and the Dwarves discussing serious business and probably recounting key events in the past, such as the coming of Smaug and Gandalf’s encounter with Thorin’s father.
This new theme — I wonder if it could be the Erebor motif? It certainly serves as a Dwarf theme, and we’ll hear it again and again.
05) Misty Mountains (1:43)
If you’ve seen the previews, you’ve heard the haunting Dwarven chorus “Over the Misty Mountains Cold”. This tune becomes a major theme for the film. “We must away ere break of day.”
06) The Adventure Begins (2:05)
A hint of Shire music. I can picture Bilbo leisurely waking up the morning after the party, and suddenly learning that he’s late for a rendezvous at the inn. The sprightly music somewhat resembles that of Merry and Pippin fleeing from Farmer Maggot in FOTR.
07) The World is Ahead (2:20) — Called “Blown Away” by the streaming audio player I listened to.
Perhaps Bilbo is being wafted like a leaf down the road, with no way to make it stop as his new adventure begins to unfold. This music resembles that of “An Unexpected Party”.
And then the heroic Misty Mountains theme emerges for the first time. This, like the heroic LOTR Fellowship theme, will sound very good with epic landscape shots.
08) An Ancient Enemy (4:58)
This is serious Mordor-type music, as at Mount Doom — along with the Dies Irae motif. There is a dark chorus sung in an ancient language. Three guesses who the enemy is. But where is he?
09) Radagast the Brown (4:55)
An ethereal boys’ chorus,…
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|Some Haunting Echoes, With New And Lovely Additions,
This Special Edition of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey’s soundtrack contains two CDs with 32 tracks, four of them exclusive to this edition and six others extended versions. It is packaged in a very handsome dark red slipcase with nice maps of northern Middle-earth decorating the interior, along with an interesting paperbound insertion by Doug Adams, author of The Music of the Lord of the Rings films, describing the music and including some of the lyrics.
Howard Shore’s beautiful music hearkens back in many ways to the masterpieces he created for the three Lord of the Rings films. I found the selections dealing with Bilbo and the other hobbits in the Shire the most beguiling, as I did the tracks for Rivendell and the White Council, which are suitably ethereal. The music for the darker scenes involving orcs, the Necromancer, and especially Gollum is much darker and more foreboding. Perhaps the most enigmatic track is the one for Radagast the Brown, a wizard who is only mentioned in the book but who is to play a significant role in the films. Perhaps because I haven’t seen the movie yet I was unable to sufficiently picture the wizard from his theme music, but that only whets my appetite.
There are two songs taken directly from Tolkien’s own words: “Blunt the Knives” and “Misty Mountains”, both performed by the Dwarf cast. I was disappointed that the last “punch” line of “Blunt the Knives” was left out, and that only part of “Misty Mountains” was included. Nevertheless I felt both conveyed much of the spirit of the book, as did “Song of the Lonely Mountain,” a new composition.
While no film or musical composition can ever sufficiently convey all the magic of Tolkien’s world the way the books do, I did enjoy this Special Edition, as I will enjoy the movie, as an imperfect but lovely depiction of a marvelous sub-creation.
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