Excalibur (Original Soundtrack)

by Bruce Eder For his first major soundtrack project, Trevor Jones had to share screen time with Richard Wagner and Carl Orff. But even in that august company, his music holds its own, a mix of post-Romantic and new age material interspersed with and decidedly antiquated folk-based sounds, pieces for tin whistle juxtaposed with works for eerie female chorus and strange musical oscillations; other works intermingle folk and classical material of extraordinary density and power. The CD also contains alternate versions of sections of the score, for the completist listener. The total score -- even minus the Wagner and Orff material -- is as spellbinding as the movie, and it's to the discredit of the business side of the production that the soundtrack (which has excellent sound) wasn't made more widely available at the time of the movie's release. As it is, the Excalibur soundtrack is a choice limited-edition collector's item.