Happy Holidays From The Second Disc

‘Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house, not a creature was stirring…not even The Second Disc.  It’s that time of year, folks, where we hope you’ll be spending time with your loved ones, looking back on the events of the past twelve months, and looking forward to a happy, healthy and fulfilling 2014.

Watch this space for some special surprises coming up soon…and rest assured that we’ll be back on a regular posting schedule in the first full week of the New Year with even more news, reviews and features just for you! We’re entering our fourth year in January, and we can promise you that 2014 will be the most exciting yet for The Second Disc.

In the meantime, Mike and I would like to wish you and yours the merriest of holidays and a very Happy New Year!  Cheers!

Kritzerland Promises Swashbuckling Adventure With Elmer Bernstein’s “The Buccaneer”

Kritzerland’s final release of 2013 is sure to be one of its most talked-about.  Today, the label announced an expanded and remastered CD presentation of Elmer Bernstein’s score to The Buccaneer.  The 1958 Paramount Picture starred the King of Siam himself, Yul Brynner, opposite Claire Bloom, Charles Boyer and Charlton Heston in a rip-roaring adventure tale loosely based on real life and set during the War of 1812.

Director Anthony Quinn’s film was a remake of Cecil B. DeMille’s 1938 movie of the same name.  The legendary DeMille had planned to direct himself, but with his health failing, he turned to his then-son-in-law Quinn to take the reins.   Both versions tell the story of Jean Lafitte, a French privateer who aided General Andrew Jackson in the Battle of New Orleans.  For his sole film as a director, Quinn’s company was led by Brynner as Lafitte, with Heston playing the key supporting role of Jackson.  (This was Heston’s second motion picture portrayal of Jackson; he previously played him in 1953’s The President’s Lady.)  The score was written by the prolific Elmer Bernstein in the same year he also scored pictures including Kings Go Forth and Some Came Running.  A fixture on Kritzerland, Bernstein just appeared on the label’s recent John Wayne at Fox compendium which featured his 1961 soundtrack to The Comancheros.

Kritzerland describes Bernstein’s score as “a beauty…filled with big and bold music and classic Bernstein themes.  The ‘Main Title’ begins with a wonderful Bernstein fanfare leading into a glorious and heroic theme, more fanfares, and then an exquisitely beautiful theme followed by more fanfares – it’s everything you’d want in a main title from a time when composers really knew how to set the tone of the film in its first minutes.  The rest of his marvelous score is loaded with drama, romance and intrigue, all in the unique and colorful Bernstein style.”

After the jump: what never-before-released music will you hear on the new Buccaneer?