Previously available in an excellent but incomplete version of stupendous sound, conducted by the also film composer Elmer Bernstein for his already extinct Filmmusic Collection (Várese Sarabande VCD47254), this new issue of Bernard Herrmann's score makes use of the original 1947 recording conducted by the own composer, and not only offers the totality of the music composed for the movie (51 minutes as compared to 38 of Bernstein's version), but makes it in a edition of good sound with some logic limitations, surprisingly stereo given the year of the recording. Much more lyric that in other occasions, such and as was requiring the wonderful movie by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, Herrmann maintains intact, nevertheless, his more common and recognizable characteristics (outstanding use of the winds, especially the assorted group of clarinets, abundance of quarter intervals in the melodic lines, etc), together with a polite use of the orchestral mass, this time most reduced and treated in a more chamber way, in which prevail the designs and developments of winds and strings over some succeeded metal and percussion touches, in a delicate and exquisite orchestration that delves in the ability of his author at the hour of handling and developing any type of musical environment.

THE GHOST AND MRS. MUIR (1947) - 50:39
20th Fox Orchestra - Conductor: Bernard Herrmann
VARESE SARABANDE VSD-5850 / 51'

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