[Nicolai P. Zwar]

Not too long ago, I noticed that I have every single feature film score Jerry Goldsmith ever composed in my collection in some form (sometimes in multiple forms).

Jerry Goldsmith is definitely one of the composers responsible for why I am here today, why I listen to film music, why I have a film music collection. I have always enjoyed film music and found it interesting, but it’s because of Jerry Goldsmith that I actually started to seek out album after album of film music — not because of the films (I often didn’t even know the films… what did I know what A PATCH OF BLUE — another all time favorite — was about when I found the album in a record store?), but because of the composer.

The initiating scores were STAR TREK – THE MOTION PICTURE, FIRST BLOOD, and POLTERGEIST. These three — still favorites to this day — were just music unlike any I had heard. It was music that was both instantly accessible and dramatically clear, yet totally different from any other music I was familiar with. So Goldsmith struck a nerve with me, and I’m very faithful, so he has been and will be always one of my favorite composers.

As far as favorites… I generally like all of Jerry Goldsmith’s scores, but there are clearly some I like a lot more than others. (I have often noted that I can do without ANGIE).
There are currently 285 albums in my collection related to “Jerry Goldsmith” (which includes compilations such as Intrada’s AMAZING STORIES, Volume 2, or his recordings of Alex North scores). So that’s quite a bit.

Hard to name favorites… but I want to give at least an idea… among my absolute hard-core favorite scores (apart from the ones I already mentioned up there)

ALIEN
That’s just one of the most interesting film scores I know… I was very happy when Intrada released the expanded edition for much better flow and more of the avant-garde writing Goldsmith employed in that score.

PLANET OF THE APES
Just one of the greatest film scores ever written. It’s one of the most accessible and fun 12-tone serial compositions I know, it’s amazing how Goldsmith manages to take an abstract avant-garde concept and write a dramatically coherent film score in that idiom.

CHINATOWN
This is probably my “most often played” Goldsmith score… but it’s short, so it’s easy to make room for it. It certainly helps that I love the movie, I’d say it’s the best movie Goldsmith ever scored. This is one of the few Goldsmith cases where, while I have both the expanded film score and the original soundtrack album, I tend to gravitate more towards the soundtrack edit of the music for listening purposes.

PAPILLON
Just one of Goldsmith’s most emotional scores. Again, terrific movie.

OUTLAND
That’s just one great score… and very dark, brooding… and some of the most aggressive action cues in film history… that music makes even Stravinsky’s Le Sacre sound mellow. I had always enjoyed the album edit, which was well done, except for the missing “Main Title”… which may be the most devastating, empty lonely-space cue Goldsmith ever composed. So I always add that even if I listen to the soundtrack album edit.

HOLLOW MAN
A totally underrated Goldsmith score, that rarely appears on the “all time best lists”. But musically, it definitely belongs there. I wanted to pick a “late Goldsmith” score before I stop, so here it is. It may have been Goldsmith’s last great “science fiction concept” score, with the swirling, punctuating electronic sounds whirling around symbolizing the molecular disintegration of Kevin Bacon’s character, who is not just losing his visibility, but his humanity. It is a brilliant fusion of orchestral muscle and cold, clinical synthesizer sonics, excellently recorded and superbly engineered and balanced by Bruce Botnick, no doubt one of the best sounding film score recordings of its kind. I had HOLLOW MAN music with me when I did test listening for new speakers some years ago. It’s a portrait of terror built from texture, momentum, and that unmistakable Goldsmith sense of danger. If the movie were anywhere near as good as this music (which it isn’t) it would be a classic.

I could name some more favorites, and even my list of “absolute” favorites is not finished… but this will do for now. 🙂