Revenge of The Sith - The soundtrack is here!

My mini review of the soundtrack (I really don't think the track names are spoilers, so I'll mention a few and leave it up to Garth and Windy):

While it is said that Beethoven's best symphonies are the odd numbered ones, I find that the most intriguing music on Williams' "Revenge of The Sith" are the even numbered tracks.

It seems that the odd numbered are the brassy, percussion driven numbers which clearly sound like accompaniment to the action scenes of a film, while the even are very dark, mysterious pieces which could stand up on their own (I've made a playlist of these on my iPod!).

My three favorites are track 6, "Palpatine's Teachings", track 8, "Padme's Ruminations", and track 10, "Anakin's Dark Deeds".

"Palpatines Teachings" begins with a suprising sound - the 'multiphonic' vocals usually associated with the monks of Tibet. It is an incredibly low and ominous sound, and creates a primordial atmosphere in which one can imagine ancient secrets being revealed. For the first minute and a half, Williams wraps this sound around a muted low horn tone and a single high bell-like harmonic (imagine the sound you make when you rub a wetted finger around the edge of a crystal goblet). Dark strings are woven in, and then ghostly far-off trumpet sounds which seems to reach to us from a distant funeral . . . Vader's "Imperial March" echoes, and transforms into a haunting version of the "Binary Sunset" theme of the Force . . .

"Padme's Ruminations" is even more chilling, beginning with a low rumble accompanied by a creepy electric string sound (à la Jimmy Page's bow technique) which morphs into a female vocal with a middle eastern quality . . .

"Anakin's Dark Deeds" begins with a sepulchral female vocal and strings until a burst of 'Carmina Burana-esque' chanting (I can't tell Latin or Sanskrit as in DoTF) explodes, and the pace picks up with drama and intensity . . .

The whole soundtrack is among Williams' finer efforts. Do yourself a favor: get it now, and listen to it repeatedly before May 19th! I can't think of a better way to get "in the mood" for RoTS!
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All I have done, since I bought the Soundtrack Saturday, have I listned to it.

Great movie, fantastic, its a masterpeice, another masterpeice by the great Jonh Williams.

I feel this is actually the best ive heard from him ever. I was blown away with it.

'General Greivous' was one of my favoruites, as well as the 'Anakin vs Obi-Wan' track. It was all great, I loved it all.

 

This soundtrack is so dark and ominous. I love it. I really don't even remember the music from a lot of the movie because the visuals and dialogue were so overwhelming. But listening to the CD now for the second time is fantastic.

 

A cool thing about this soundtrack.

The tracks on the score that didn't really do anything for me before seeing the film (Palpatine's teachings and Padme's ruminations) completely turned around when I saw the film.

The use of Palpatines teachings in the film is absolutely chilling, and I always thought that since it starts so "ambient" like, it would be very low in the mix. But it's actually quite loud, and it works so good.

 

I just LOVE 'Palpatine's Teachings.' If I was shown that song title a year ago I would have died of a heart attack. Teachings from the Sith Lord were one of the things I most desired in this film.

When Hyperspace was talking about the Opera, I feared it would be another Jedi Rocks type of scene. I couldn't have been more wrong.