Now that Marco Polo’s film score series has moved to Naxos, listeners have a chance to hear many wonderful titles at reduced price, including this new one that’s never previously appeared. There’s something fitting in hearing this wonderful, pre-Elmer Bernstein Western score by a Russian composer played by Russian forces, and it sounds like they’re having a ball. Yes, you can’t understand a word the chorus is singing, and probably wouldn’t want to, but the music that Dimitri Tiomkin penned for this cattle roundup celluloid spectacular fits like a glove, from the famous Stampede sequence (with three sets of timpani making a very satisfying noise), to atmospheric tracks such as The Spectre Takes Form, Suspense at Dawn, and Vigil in the Night. Tiomkin’s sonic palette, as befits a “Golden Age” (1948) Hollywood production, is more lush than we later came to expect in this particular genre, with plenty of harps and warm tunes for the strings; but the “American” sound is all there, and it’s irresistibly conveyed by William Stromberg and his Moscow forces. Vividly bright sonics add the finishing touch. A winner on all counts. [3/28/2005]
