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| Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World | 
 enlarge | Artists: Christopher Gordon, Richard Tognetti
Creators: Iva Davies, Johann Sebastian Bach, Luigi Boccherini, Arcangelo Corelli, Iva / Gordon, Christopher / Tognetti, Richard Davies, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, English Traditional, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Barry Wordsworth, Christopher Gordon, Richard Tognetti, New Queen's Hall Orchestra, Michael Fisher, Simon Oswell, Bruce Dukov
Label: Decca
Category: Music
List Price: $18.98
Buy New: $8.63
You Save: $10.35 (55%)
Buy New/Used from $7.89
Avg. Customer Rating:  (49 reviews)
Sales Rank: 1757
Format: Soundtrack
Languages: English (Original Language), French (Original Language), Portuguese (Original Language)
Media: Audio CD
Discs: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 5.6 x 4.9 x 0.4
MPN: 000157402
UPC: 028947539827
EAN: 0028947539827
ASIN: B0000DG07D
Release Date: November 11, 2003
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 wonderful music stands alone July 19, 2004
11 out of 11 found this review helpful
I have been listening to this CD regularly since January and have yet to be bored with it. It has a wonderful variety of the powerful, serious and playful. And it gives more complete versions of the music in the film.
Great! July 4, 2004
6 out of 8 found this review helpful
I really enjoy all the pieces on this CD. When the music is not being played in the movie it still sounds good. The Mozart piece is the best.
 Ok but not at all great June 10, 2004
1 out of 39 found this review helpful
When I watched the movie I don't even recall remembering much of the music. Maybe I wasn't paying attention or maybe it wasn't so good that my ears even wanted to pick it up. When I watched the movie a second time I payed more attetion to the score and the result was. The score wasn't all that good. An OK but nothing more.
The Gift that Keeps on Giving June 8, 2004
8 out of 10 found this review helpful
Many good points have been made by others regarding this soundtrack so I will simply give what I consider to be a most relevant point: it stuck with me. Each time I watch the film I find myself for several days afterwards humming the tunes as I go about my daily routine until it drives me to pop the DVD in once more. I cannot recommend it highly enough both for fans of the film and books alike.
 The classical duets and sailor songs work well without the film May 24, 2004
44 out of 50 found this review helpful
I really mean it as a compliment when I say that the score for "Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World" suffers a bit when you are listening to it divorced from the film. It would be the same thing as saying that Jack Aubrey is not quite the man ashore that he is when he is afloat on H.M.S. "Surprise," so fans of Patrick O'Brian's seafaring yarns of the British Navy during the Napoleonic era will understand my point. It is not surprising that in the search for authenticity, which was one of the hallmark of the Aubry-Maturin series, that director Peter Weir went in a different direction from the stirring music associated with movies where Errol Flynn was sailing the seven seas. After all, a score was needed for this film that would compliment those moments when the crew would break into song or the captain and his particular friend would retire to play a duet for violin and cello. Violinist Richard Tognetti plays the violin and taught actor Russell Crowe how to play as well. The other main contributors to the soundtrack are composers Iva Davies ("The Ghost of Time") and Christopher Gordon ("Moulin Rouge"), but Weir also selected several classical and traditional folk pieces to appear in the film as well. If you were expecting a bold brassy score for "Master and Commander" then you will be disappointed, but you would have known better if you ever read the books.
With two composers and the other two types of music thrown into the mix, this soundtrack does not offer anything close to a cohesive whole, and you preference is probably going to be for the fiddle and drum songs of the sailors on deck (e.g., the medley of "O'Sullivan's March, Cuckold Comes Out of the Amery, Mother Hen, Mary Scott, Nancy Dawson") and the duets played in the captain's quarters (e.g., Mozart's Violin Concerto No. 3 "Straussburg" K.215, 3rd Movement). The main plot of the film involves a chase between "Surprise" and a French raider, but there are also sections of dramatic tedium, for which the classical music plays nicely. The music for the battles seem almost out of place given what we have become accustomed to in the rest of the film.
What stands out in the battle sequences is Mike Fisher on his Taiko drums, who provides the driving power of the scenes, matching the action on screen below the decks as the guns are being run out and fired. The emphasis is more on rhythm than anything else, which is why what works on screen is not as interesting when listening to the CD. Of the three composers the string work by Tognetti stands out the most, even as it distances itself from what is written by Davies and Gordon. The soundtrack is pretty much divided evenly between the original and classical/traditional works, and with a total playing time of barely over a half-hour you have to be disappointed on that score as well. An appropriate reaction would be to just go back and watch the film or to track down complete recordings of the classical pieces by Mozart, Bach, Ralph Vaughn Williams, Arcangelo Corelli, and Luigi Boccherini, or even some of the traditional sailor songs.
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