joelparnis

It's funny how much this has divided people. I like the score, it is a good mature piece of writing that captures the tone of the novel for the most part with some absolute stand out cues. Desplat uses his orchestra to gorgeous effect and to all those who are saying this is mediocre at best... Well, enjoy never being happy with anything but Williams it seems, and as we get further into the next decade his scores will become fewer and fewer. Just because a score doesn't have a loud and out there theme does not make it mediocre. Putting this score, which has some beautifully subtle and intricate work, among the ranks of HBP and OotP implies deafness more than anything else. You clearly are not actually listening properly to the music. You will never hear a 'When Ginny kissed Harry' in a Desplat score, his writing has far more going on than that, and if you can't hear it... well, your loss. Maybe it's because I enjoy desplat's work in general, but he is a smart writer who's scores do more than fill the background of a film with sound, they build atmosphere and carry emotional weight through each note without being intrusive in anyway. Go watch Benjamin button, or the Queen to feel his music at work. I'm almost certain this score will work beautifully with images on a screen. And I can't wait to feel the music as I watch DH for the first time.

'Lovegood' is such an interesting blend of styles and instruments, i find it really strangely beautiful to listen to...

Yes, there's no doubt in my mind that if Johnny were to return i'd be skipping down the street for a least a couple of days, but i would not be upset to hear where Desplat wants to take his ideas further in a score for Part 2. Just listening to 'Bathilda Bagshot' at the moment, and loving how its playing out perfectly with the images of that scene i have in my head. Its one of the most chilling sequences in the book and i can almost see the action playing as i listen to this cue. I LOVE the incredibly subtle childlike music box melody playing from about 1:45, very eerie... urgh this scene freaks me out.... i love it. Hermione's parents is one track i'm not quite getting fully where it sits in the story, guess i will have to wait and see.

Hedwig's Theme is heard in tracks 3 (Polyjuice Potion), 4 (Sky Battle) and 7 (The Will). Was listening to the score on the bus home from work tonight, and i'm really enjoying the maturity of this score. And as a huge fan of the books, this really is capturing parts of the novel for me. There are some times in the book where the tone is so stark and with an undercurrent of such helplessness as the trio struggles to really do the task at hand, and i can just hear the despair in a lot of these tracks. Desplat has really captured the feel beautifully for me: i agree that some more fully realized themes would have been nice, but this is a good score people, and i can see it working very well with the film.

It is the best HP score since Azkaban. Doesn't touch the Williams scores still, but it evokes much more feeling and has a lot more style in its execution than the previous 3 scores. The orchestrations are lovely thanks Mr. Pope! There are times where it sounds so much like a Williams score in its orchestra, made me very happy and another reason why I rank it as the best since Williams. Even though Desplat has a very different voice to the Maestro, the soundscape is much closer to the big familiar HP sound we've all missed since the early scores. I have heard stronger structural thematic work from Desplat in the past. There is a theme for the trio / friendship theme that is lovely and very heart warming, but not particularly memorable. There's a Death Eaters theme which has a lot of motion and pulse in it which i quite like. Also there is a theme that seems to associate with The Locket i think which almost hints at the Hooper's Possession Theme (but that could be an accident considering how simple that melody is). I'll have to give it another listen soon because i'm sure there were more. 'Hedwig's Theme' can be heard in tracks 3, 4 and 7 and there is a big gaping hole at the start of track 1 which i'm hoping will have Hedwig's Theme over the top of it as the main title appears in the film. Though i'm loving Desplat's work here, i would be a little devastated if we didn't at least hear the theme over the titles. Can't wait to see the score work in the film, i think it's going to work very well just judging by what i've heard. Its a very solid piece of work. Off to work now!

These new samples really do sound like they'll make for a great score. I do hope to hear some Williams references in the film, but I'm not going to go to Desplat's house with a torch and pitchfork if he doesn't use it anymore than the previous two composers did. The reaction of some people here is a little much. I'm sure Desplat worked his butt off trying to write the best score he possibly could for this film, he knows how much exposure this will get him with a new audience, and if in doing that he didn't feature someone else's theme on the OST as much as some fanboys would have liked than that is his choice. Let his music will speak for itself. Arrogant, rude, liar - i mean, really? The man is doing his job, and by the sounds of these latest clips, he's done it well.

These are 30 second clips people. What gets me excited is the fact that you can actually hear movement in the clips, they have a motion to them and i trust Desplat enough as a composer that beyond the 45 second point (where amazon tracks tend to take their samples from) he is moving each individual piece through different shades and variations musically (hell, you can hear that anyway in a couple of tracks). This isn't like a 'When Ginny kissed Harry' example, where a 20 second clip of Hooper's track would actually give a full representation of how that WHOLE piece sounds. Also, Desplat is a good thematic composer, and i doubt he decided to change that aspect of his style for Deathly Hallows, so i look forward to hearing the full OST in a couple of weeks. If you want another great example of Desplat at his best, go watch 'The Queen'. That film has such an interesting and very specific tone, and Desplat absolutely nailed it with his score.

I love this film, and find its flaws make it all the more interesting. I agree that there does seem to be something wrong with the script and the way the ending is paced makes it feel like there are several false endings and as a result audiences do get fatigued before the film reaches what should be its emotional climax. Sadly a lot of general viewers have lost interest by that point and what should be a real moment for the character is completely missed which is a shame. I thing i find so fascinating about the end is that it feels like Spielberg sentiment but deep down it is a much colder ending and much more Kubrick. The fact of the matter is that David's dream final day is completely fabricated, none of it is real, and i imagine that when he 'dies' he is actually just being shut down because the super robots can see what he has been through and decide to give his programmed mind an equally programmed sense of going to sleep and resting in peace. Its actually a complete reversal of sentimentality in my opinion and i love the film for being the massive and complex film experiment it became (i say experiment because it really is a mesh of two very different styles of direction meeting in the middle). Some people love it and some people hate it. The score is one of my absolute favourites of Williams. Its odd that considering the story is about artificial emotions that the score conjures so much genuine heart ache. I was on the bus listening to the soundtrack for the first time in years just the other day and there were moments that i actually could feel my heart welling up with emotion just from the music; 'Stored memories' 'Abandoned in the woods' and especially 'the search for the blue fairy' are filled with moments of such heart breaking sadness that you wouldn't think the film was scored for character without a heart. If you haven't gathered yet... I LOVE this score!!

YES! Very excited for this, those clips sound promising for an exciting and colourful score. Love hearing a fuller orchestral sound for the HP series again.

'Farewell to Dobby' actually has a little dignity about it. And doesn't treat the death like a dot point version of the films narrative.

No worries. It seems clear that you a lot of skill. I guess there's not much else to say except keep trying. Some dreams are worth striving for I don't know much about the film scoring industry but I imagine its a hard slog getting your name established in the biz. So all the best, hope to see your name attached to something soon.

Hey, really enjoying this so far. Because I'm new, this may be an ignorant question but, are you working in the industry? Only because it seems like you have quite a lot of talent, and i would hope your out getting your musical voice heard.

I like the track titles. Nothing so blatant or annoyingly obvious like the previous scores. Even though i know the books backwards it still always annoys me to see track titles like "death of Sirius" or "Cedric Dies". Bleh! I like it when Composers actually name their tracks like they are pieces of music to be heard by an outside audience, not something they might have scribbled down once to remember what scene they're supposed to be scoring which later turned into a title.

I am becoming quite the fan of Desplat, I remember watching the film 'The Queen' without knowing who had scored it at the time and being absolutely sucked in by the music. As its already been stated, Desplat got the tone of the score so right I'm unsure how anyone could have done it. I find the film has a very unique feel, its not a romanticised depiction as anything with the royal family as subject can become, it almost feels like a documentary, because the direction and acting is so understated and somehow Desplat managed to create a beautiful score that resonated so much with me, while never over powering of over emoting a single thing. I love this score. Golden Compass i am also quite a fan of, but i agree that the later half of the score is very heavy (or 'noisy') and whenever i give it a listen i seem to switch scores around track 12. However I love his theme for Dust and I really think his nailed the quieter mysterious parts of the score. I wish this film had turned out better as I love love LOVE the books. I think its interesting that someone said the score feels clinical, because to a point I actually think the feel of the world around Lyra in Pullman's universe feels very clinical, particularly where the adult characters are concerned. Everyone is cold and calculating (with a couple of obvious exceptions) and perhaps the score captured that. I can't wait for Deathly Hallows, if Williams couldn't do it, he would have probably been my first choice. This score may be the deal maker for me, and may decide if Desplat is my current favourite steadily working composer (I love James Newton Howard for a while, but its been a while since anything of his really has hit my raydar). I hope Alexandre hits DH out of the park. *fingers crossed*

yes, of any problems in the recent Harry Potter scores, i wouldn't say over using Hedwig's Theme is one of them. And i don't think it's because the theme is out of touch with the tone of the current films either, it just needs to be adapted appropriately. I actually love Hooper's use of the theme in OotP ( the very few times it is briefly on display), my favourite being the very dark and ominous version of theme which plays under where Harry picks up and hears the Prophecy in the department of Mysteries. For me, Hedwig's theme does not represent the Owl or Harry, but rather Harry's introduction and further discoveries into the wizarding world (as Hedwig is very much a metaphor for childhood innocence entering this new world) and the theme is actually very versatile and can be adapted appropriately. As I said, i love Hooper's working of the theme in this pivotal moment of discovery in the series and i only wish he had continued this trend in HBP (which he didn't do unfortunately). In Gof and HBP, Hedwig's Theme seems to function merely as a nice piece of scene transition scoring which completely misses the point of this wonderful bit of music IMO.

I own all six, being a HP fan, and I like all of them for something even though the last three are clearly not in the same league. I agree that I find Doyle's a little too Bombastic, but i do enjoy the waltzes a lot. Out of Hooper's work I actually quite enjoy OotP and have a couple of Highlights in HBP; I think Hooper's best work in HBP is of a higher standard than his best in OotP, but unfortunately HBP is very inconsistent IMO Can't wait to hear Desplat's work, as he is one of my favourite composers working in film today. Will be buying the Collector's i imagine...I'm a massive sucker for pretty packaging hehe