The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring - Original Motion Picture Soundtrack Music

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Shore creates a strong theme for the movie, and its characters, and maintains this strength throughout. It's nice to see choral pieces finding their way into cinema soundtracks again, especially ones in the haunting Elvish language, which has resonances with Gaelic and Welsh dialects. They're barely noticeable in some tracks, but still add to the haunting and mystical atmosphere.

The best track? Probably "The Breaking of the Fellowship". It's an epic track, with sweeping violin strings and a perfectly conveyed sense of parting, seguing perfectly into Enya's "May it Be."

I can only hope that Shore continues this with his "The Two Towers" soundtrack, out next month.

This soundtrack does what every perfect soundtrack should do: play as background music so fitting that subconsciously the music enters our minds and influences our opinions of the scene, and compliments it beautifully. But on its own it's even better......hard not to believe that the first time I saw the movie I never noticed the score.

Some of my favorite tracks:

#2 Concerning Hobbits It's a beautiful, sweet track with panflute-like instruments.

#8 Flight to the Ford The beginning (complimenting when ~Arwen~ comes to Frodo) sounds angelic, ethereal, and just plain lovely. But then the ringwraiths come. I can't describe the theme (aaaah) but it gives me the creeps and I've heard that the words being sung are in Mordor tongue.

#9 Many Meetings All I can say is that it captures the beauty of Rivendell. Anyone who knows the elven-city can believe how mystical and enchanting the song is.

#10 The Council of Elrond The beginning with Aniron--Theme for Aragorn and Arwen, sung by Enya is just so Elvish and Arwenish that it goes beyond belief (ok, ok I liked Evenstar on the TTT soundtrack better but Aniron's great too) and the lyrics are great (Tiro! En eria e mor/I lir en el luitha uren/Ai! Aniron Undomiel [that means Look! A star rises out of the darkness/the song of the star enchants my heart/ah I desire Evenstar]). The rest of it, leading up to a heroic theme and a finishing cymbal clash, symbolizes the start of the Fellowship of the Ring. Now on from here I love all of the tracks, but my favorite favorites....

#13 The Bridge of Khazad-dum I LOVE THIS TRACK! It's the gentle hobbit/heroic fellowship theme combined into a HUGE CLASHING absolutely inspiring dwarvish track. The end is very sad though, because it's a solo boy's voice with a soft boys' choir in the background. It goes along with Gandalf's *death* almost too well...it saddens me deeply *sniffs*.

#17 The Breaking of the Fellowship Well....I almost cry sometimes when I listen to this. It starts with a single violin note.....which joins into a tragicly moving piece....which goes into an even sadder part where Sam almost drowns and Frodo pulls him up. Then the fellowship theme is changed again, this time upbeat with drums tapping in the background, as Aragorn Legolas and Gimli run off to rescue Merry and Pippin. And then it goes into the vocal song "In Dreams". I love this song. Edward Ross (the guy who sang it) has a great voice! I love the lyrics so much I'll type them here:

When the cold of winter comes
Starless night will cover day
In the veiling of the sun
We will walk in bitter rain
But in dreams
I can hear your name
And in dreams
We will meet again
When the seas and mountains fall
And we come to end of days
In the dark I hear a call
Calling me there
I will go there
And back again

As I said, I love that song.

#18 May It Be Enchanting. Mythical. I love Enya's voice. The lyrics don't make a whole lot of sense (following the pattern of most Enya songs) but one line "May it be an evening star shines down upon you" corresponds very well with Galadriel's line "May it be a light to you in dark places when all other lights go out". Also the line "May it be when darkness falls your heart will be true" is a pointed message to Boromir lol. But this is a great song.

So go buy this! The greatest CD in the world....

:)

This CD is wonderful! I ran out to the store and bought it the day it first became available, and I have listened to it for hours. I enjoyed it the first time I heard it. After watching the movie (four times & counting) nearly a month later, I haven't been able to take this out of my CD player for very long (sometimes switching it for Blind Guardian's "Nightfall in Middle Earth" for variety).

Howard Shore has really captured the sweeping emotions of Peter Jackson's excellent film: from the mythic opening track "The Prophecy;" to the simple and delightful "Concerning Hobbits;" to the imperious and frightening "Shadow of the Past" and "Treason of Isengard;" to the enchantment of "The Council of Elrond/Aniron;" to the determination and triumph of "The Ring Goes South;" to the desperation and grief of "The Bridge of Khazad Dum;" to the weirdness of "Lothlorien;" to the bittersweet "Breaking of the Fellowship." Enya's haunting "May It Be" is the perfect ending to the soundtrack.

My favourite bits of the soundtrack are tracks 11, 12 & 13, 15, 17, 18. Shore uses very powerful choral work in several of the pieces, performed stirringly by the London Voices, The London Oratory School Schola. Edward Ross, in particular, makes "The Bridge of Khazad Dum" incredibly powerful.

"Concerning Hobbits," which becomes the hobbit theme, reminds me of the hymn "This is My Father's World." I think that's appropriate, because of the innocence and simplicity of the hobbits.

The soundtrack is made infinitely more powerful by viewing the movie. I think that's true of all movies, of course; after seeing the movie you know exactly what's happening during moments of the soundtrack. Just as there were parts of the movie that moved me to tears, there are parts of the soundtrack that nearly do so, during repeated listenings.

This is probably one of my top five soundtracks of all time, and it's coming close to edging out number one Gettysburg and number two Gladiator. I heartily recommend this CD!