La-La Land Records Releasing a 3-CD Set of TNG Scores at Comic-Con!

[Bad Atom]

Having listened to all three discs now, I'd say "Code of Honor" and "Haven" are the highlights of the whole set.

And with a few exceptions, the Chattaway disc is largely forgettable. His first few scores were great, but he fell in line fairly quickly. I'd say his music doesn't get interesting again until the later years of Voyager.

[Scotty]

doubleohfive wrote:

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Likewise, the studio/production company/whoever would still be paying composers to write new music (however similar or rehashed it eventually would become) for every episode, so I don't see how it could be seen as Berman "cost-cutting."

Ron Jones used larger orchestras than McCarthy. He would sometimes use 60 or more musicians on certain episodes. This would of course mean that his scores were more expensive to produce.

[Christopher]

Scotty wrote:

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Ron Jones used larger orchestras than McCarthy. He would sometimes use 60 or more musicians on certain episodes. This would of course mean that his scores were more expensive to produce.

Your figures are incorrect. According to the FSM stats, the largest orchestra Jones ever employed was 59 members, and the overall average was 42 members. (Averages: S1: 38 members; S2: 50; S3: 44; S4: 37.) The numbers were highest in the second season, and in the fourth season he always used orchestras smaller than 40 members except for BOBW Pt. 2. So he was certainly capable of working with smaller, less costly ensembles, particularly given how much he relied on electronics.

[TV's Frank]

Bad Atom wrote:

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Having listened to all three discs now, I'd say "Code of Honor" and "Haven" are the highlights of the whole set.

And with a few exceptions, the Chattaway disc is largely forgettable. His first few scores were great, but he fell in line fairly quickly. I'd say his music doesn't get interesting again until the later years of Voyager.

Oddly enough, I find myself quite enjoying the Chattaway disc quite a bit, discovering the recurring thematic material he could weave... his scores for "Darmok" and "The Host" are both standouts for me from this disc, along with "Relics" and "The Perfect Mate". Subtle, yes, different than his early "Tin Man" score for sure, but still engaging...

[KirkPicard]

The highlight of the set for me was the Dennis McCarthy cue from "The Child," "Rendezvous M11" What a theme to herald the return of TNG in Season 2! I may need to have that as my computer start up cue.

[Christopher]

Just listened to "Code of Honor." I agree with what someone said above -- it's even better than I remembered. It's great being able to hear it in the clear and really be able to hear all its orchestral textures. It's a bit amusing reading in the liner notes about how Steiner was trying to do a mix of the classic Trek sound and a more modern orchestral/electronic sound, because aside from a smattering of electronics in the background of a few cues, this is a full-on classic 1960s-style score, in the same idiom as Steiner's TOS work. Indeed, that unused cue, "Code of Honor M41," sounds downright '40s in style, which may be why it wasn't used. But the whole thing's great. I love how richly melodic and motif-driven it is. I can't understand Berman's belief that reusing melodies made music sound repetitive or tracked from stock. This score is a fine example of how music can be built from developing variations on a motif. The interest lies in hearing how a recognized melody gets changed into something different each time, that tension or balance between the familiar and the new. The familiarity of the motif gives you the grounding to recognize how it's been made different.

My least favorite part of the "Code of Honor" score used to be the climactic fight ("Competition"/"Deadly Blow"), for a reason that may sound strange: its main melody, a succession of two-note patterns increasing in pitch, sounds very much like a cue from George Duning's score for "Is There in Truth No Beauty?" So I had trouble getting past the cognitive dissonance of hearing something in a Steiner score that reminded me of Duning. But on the CD, where I can hear the rich, driving bass of the ostinato, it sounds really powerful and compelling. Plus I've had nearly a quarter-century to get used to the fact that that melody is part of the episode's score.

My other disappointment back in the day was that Steiner didn't use any of his own TOS cues. He had a recurring Enterprise theme that he debuted in "Mudd's Women" and used several other times, sort of an inversion of the Courage fanfare, and that theme's always been a favorite of mine. And there were a couple of other motifs he reused in multiple episodes, motifs that made them characteristically "Steiner." I kinda missed those signature motifs in this score. Still, now that I have decades of familiarity with its themes and get to hear the score in such clear detail, I can tell that it's definitely in Steiner's classic style of melody and orchestration, and that's very satisfying, especially after the Chattaway disc with very few highlights standing out from the wallpaper.

In fact, I'm not sure any of Steiner's TOS scores sound quite this rich. Would it be safe to surmise that he had a bigger orchestra here than he ever did on TOS? I don't think it's quite my favorite Steiner score melodically, but it's certainly one of the most gorgeously executed ones, and a real treat to listen to.

[Christopher]

Finally finished the set. Don Davis's "Face of the Enemy" score started out a bit bland and Chattawayesque, but most of it was very impressive and rich, more strongly melodic than most TNG scores. It used a couple of recurring motifs that evoked Horner's Wrath of Khan score, but Davis is a better composer than Horner so it worked out okay. It's too bad this was Davis's only Trek score, though I can see why Berman wouldn't have wanted him back.

John Debney's "The Pegasus" score was rather generic. Basically it underlined how good Debney was at mimicking Dennis McCarthy (something his SeaQuest scores also demonstrated). There were only a few brief moments where I heard hints of Debney's own voice as a composer. His work on DS9 was stronger, I think. Perhaps the one really noteworthy thing about the "Pegasus" score is that it's probably the last TNG episode (by a wide margin) to make substantial use of the Alexander Courage fanfare.

[roliver]

FYI, sales of this set are not doing well, and the chances of a second volume are not assured:

http://www.filmscoremonthly.com/boar...6&r=892#bottom

[Christopher]

^Unfortunate, but not really surprising. I can't imagine there are a lot of passionate fans of the music of TNG. Honestly, now that we've got the first six episodes, the full Ron Jones canon, "Tin Man," "Darmok," "The Inner Light," "Face of the Enemy," and Generations, I don't really see what more there could be in TNG scores that's worth releasing. Some VGR and ENT stuff, maybe some DS9 stuff, sure, but TNG? No.

I still say their next box set should be the rest of the TOS scores that haven't yet been released.

[Scotty]

roliver wrote:

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FYI, sales of this set are not doing well, and the chances of a second volume are not assured:

http://www.filmscoremonthly.com/boar...6&r=892#bottom

In all honesty, this isn't a very good set. I've listened to the set in its entirety and there just isn't enough memorable music on it. Sure, it's lovingly produced, but it all comes down to music selection.

[Christopher]

^Yeah, the ratio of good stuff to mediocre stuff is low, but I still think it was worth it for "Haven," "Darmok," "Code of Honor," and "Face of the Enemy."

[doubleohfive]

The way I see it, we now live in a world where more TNG music has been released officially whereas this time two years ago, we didn't. Whether the music is mediocre or not, it's been worth it to me for the nostalgia alone. I realize not everyone feels that way, but I've always had a particularly soft spot in my heart for TNG, so whaddyagonnado?

[TrekAlliance92]

It is true that all of the material on the new TNG set was a hit, but there was quite a bit I enjoyed--mostly the early Season 1/Season 2 stuff as well as the "Pegasus" score and other cues here and there.

I do hope more TNG music (and more Trek scores in general) come along. There's still several early TNG episodes that haven't had any music from them released that I'd like to see, and beyond that of course, great stuff from DS9, Voyager and Enterprise.

[dfrolik]

I was extremely excited about this release, I absolutely didn't expect any TNG music to be released anymore, already Ron Jones' set surprised me a lot. While I think that this set features some of TNG's best, my favorites being Haven, The Child, Time Squared, Conundrum, The Survivors, Silicon Avatar, Darmok, Remember Me, Face of the Enemy and The Pegasus, I agree that the selection overall is not particularly good. For example Hide and Q and Conspiracy are fantastic scores but in my opinion they selected the wrong parts of the episodes. Hide and Q for instance would have had a fantastic dramatic opening sequence, and Conspiracy's best music was in the first part of the episode after Picard decides to take the detour to Dytallix or when they find the debris of the destroyed ship. The music they chose to release for Conspiracy was very effective in the episode but is simply not "nice" enough to listen to often. Also, instead of featuring 3 different versions of the Waltz in The Survivors, they should have released one more or all 3 of the ship attack sequences, some of McCarthy's best action music ever. Other episodes I think would deserve a release would be The Arsenal of Freedom, Peak Performance, The Hunted, The Wounded, Redemption, Power Play, among others. I agree with many others who posted here that the choices on disc 2 were surprising, indeed half of Chattaway's scores featured are some of his most uninteresting like Starship Mine and I Borg, there's simply no excitement whatsoever. While I think that Fred Steiner's Code of Honor is interesting, I also think that his music was not suitable for TNG, too old fashioned. I loved Debney's Pegasus score. While it resembles McCarthy's scores a lot it's somehow more melodic, it just feels like something new. I remember when I first watched the Pegasus I thought this was McCarthy's score, but I was confused because I noticed that it's somehow different.
I really hope that more TNG releases will follow especially from the earlier seasons but I imagine that this is very unlikely, unless one of the composers releases an album of their own. I still hope to this day that some of McCarthy's music from the MacGyver series will be released as it was very similar to his earlier Star Trek work but less restrained and more thematic. It's actually very interesting to listen to MacGyver and Star Trek episodes which were aired around the same time and compare McCarthy's scores for these episodes. I think his best time was around the beginning of season 3 TNG (The Survivors and The Hunted), around the same time he scored his best MacGyver score The Legend of the Holy Rose (season 5 cliffhanger), which should be released for sure, every minute of it.
Nevertheless, a huge thanks to the producers of this album, I love listening to it despite some of the downfalls I mentioned above.

[roliver]

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