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5.0 out of 5 stars
The Two Towers-The Complete Recordings/ A Critical Review, July 21 2007
* A Review of boxed set
* Download on MP3/ IPod Player
* Price
I think any music lover, and especially those who love classical, will want to take a look at this boxed set and The Fellowship of The Ring, Complete Recordings for the same reason. It is fabulous.
The boxed set, come in a square box that is roughly length of a hand. It opens with the DVD audio version on the left. A book placemarker over the remaining set to the right. There's a beautiful 43 and 45 page booklet, respectively (That is, Fellowhip, Two Towers-- in order) and not as noted as a 48-page. Nevertheless, it has some annotations about the orchestral construction and Mr. Shore's ideas on themes as it relates to the characters, places and events of the particular movie. There isn't a complete notation on all tracks. In the Two Towers booklet, 2nd to last page, Mr. Shore says more info can be sought from [...]
The Two Towers. (There are wonderful reviews of The Fellowship pieces already on the customer review page.) What I found in terms of themes is fewer than in Fellowship. The music, orchestration is coordinated with the film, but a lot more aggressive. This is not a bad thing. You can easily feel the story being told when as each track is playing-- no annotation necessary. I found Track 1 of disc 1, luring me in immediately. The opening theme is repeated periodically, but not as often as in Fellowship. Disc 1, according to the booklet, is Smeagol/ Gollum's descent. But any of the tracks as that same exalted beginning slowly (deteriorating?) to a slow, almost maudlin tempo nothing demonstates this more than track 7 or "The Banishment of Eomer". I wondered as the tracks were playing and realized that Smeagol's descent and quest for the rings is no different than each of the characters preoccupation with redemption and "demonstrating one's quality." The beginning of this piece is indeed one of royalty and by the end it has slowed down to one of almost torment. Also track 10, "Fangorn" there is (for the 1st time) an introduction of a drum set. This is the introduction of the city of Trees within Fangorn. It takes on a new, more profound reality when place in the context of their formation-- discussed in The Silmarillion-- when Yavanna, an angel is questioning Mamwe about the prophecy that both men and Dwarves would bear no responsibility for the life of trees. She imparts upon them the ability to show anger when their safety is in peril. Nothing is more clearer when you hear this.
Disc 2, revolves around the life in Edoras. The theme is replayed several times and each time the image of a possessed Theoden slumped on the throne and Ewoyn rushing out to the veranda and Gandalf, Aragon, Legolas and Gimli reach the gates of the city are reinforced in my mind. The grandeur of a once valiant and great kingdom, the sorrow of its lost. Along the way there's the return of the theme of Isengard interspesed.
Disc 3, The tempo is faster and more agitative. The theme is war runs through each track. This is indeed the most volatile of the the discs.
The Two Towers (and The Fellowship...) Complete Recordings require no imagination as to where the pieces belong. It's very easy to relive the movies as the tracks are played. There isn't a moment when you're not aware that this is a masterpiece of artistic expression.
Download info
Both The Fellowship and The Two Towers Complete recordings can fit as an MP3 file on a 1Gig player with several albums to spare. If you only buy an MP3 for the Soundtracks, you can definitely fit, the entire trilogy. And, I mean there also room for next years The Return, because in addition to the two complete I have an additional 5 album of average length.
*If you want to hear the Complete recordings in high fidelity, you'll need to make this adjustment. An uncompressed file format (there are several) will enable you to hear the recordings as they should be, unlike an mp3 file which removes sound code to make it small. For each box set, you'll need to have a 2 Gig player that will allow for uncompressed files. 1 Gig is not enough, 2 give you about 30 minutes of free space. For each minute of uncompressed music, you'll need 10MB of space. The Fellowship is roughly about 181 minutes in length and The Two Towers is roughly about 189 or a 4 Gig player for both boxed sets. If you're planning on waiting for The Return you may need only about 6 Gig's for all, because with the extra hour on a 4 Gig, that should offset if The Return...King Recordings runs into 4 discs.
For "I-Pod"
(I just got a wonderful email from D. McAlester about a better way to download an uncompressed version of the boxed sets. Instead of using the AIFF, "D" suggests using the file format Apple Lossless Codec...
Andre,
i would actually recommend converting to ALAC (apple lossless audio codec). It applies a simple run-length encoding compression algorithm, but unlike MP3/AAC it does not lose audio fidelity. The files are much larger than MP3/AAC, but about half to three-quarters the size of AIFF. )
If you have a PC (as opposed to a Mac) you'll need to upload the latest I-Tunes Music file from the Apple website. The Mac should already have it installed.
Then, Preference>
Advance>
Import>
(select) Apple Lossless (preferably) or AIFF
download, then sync as usual.
About the price. I've been a part of LOTR chat-room discussing various aspects of the Complete Recordings for several weeks now. My view is this. We should buy the Complete recordings because they far surpass the experience of the single-disc versions-- and I own them, too. But, that should not be taken for granted by the recording company as someone who'll pay anything for the boxed sets because I'm a fan. I used to work in the industry and I can tell you that the residual that Mr. Shore and co. are going to make is not nearly what they should be getting from the sale of each set. The manufacturing costs of a cd is 3 cents, the dvd is 6 and a double-side dvd is 9 cents. Artists are paid by a point system. 6 points, 7 points, 8 points. Each point can be worth approximately 4 to 5 cents each or thereabouts. For boxed a little more for music clubs, considerably less. For a $60 (or $75 MSRP), Mr. Shore will probably not get $5. So where does all the profit go to? That a question that has been historically answered in "production" "marketing", or a number of value one-term answers.
Just a short while ago, my daughter told me that she gets all her music from the internet. I was shocked when her mother and step-father don't see anything intrinsically wrong with this. Although I have grave concerns about the ethics of the recording industry, they do pay most of the artist some royalty. For that reason alone, I scolded her and told her that she is in part stealing the money from people who make their living as an artist.
If you love classical music...if you love the soundtracks. You'll love this work.
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~ Soundtracks & Original Casts
~ Soundtracks & Original Casts
by J. R. R. Tolkien
See all 16 tracks on this disc
