Phillip Lambro – The Film Music of Phillip Lambro

Phillip Lambro – The Film Music of Phillip Lambro / 2008 Perseverance / 25 Tracks / http://www.wimbtri.com/lambrobio.html

The amount of music that is present on “The Film Music of Phillip Lambro” is simply stunning. Essentially, what Perseverance did here was put Lambro’s musing on four movies – Mineral King, Father Pat, Celebration, and Git! – onto one composition. Individuals may be familiar with Lambro’s previous scores, which included works done for Blood Voyage (Nightmare Voyage in the U.K.), Murph The Surf, La Tumba de la Isla Maldita, and And Now Miguel.

Perseverance is a record label that was created in the hope that old movie scores would be saved for future posterity; to do that, the label has created compositions such as this one. Lambro and Perseverance have worked together in the past; the aforementioned “Murph The Surf” and “La Tumba de la Isla Maldita” were re-released in the years past. While it is likely that individuals are not familiar with one or more of the movies that Lambro scored on this album, the skill of Lambro eirself comes in the ability to tell a story with eir music. Where it is common in the current period for film musicians to do little more than mimic the action that is happening during the film, Lambro takes that step forward and really crafts music that could stand-alone (as it does well during this album). This disc does well in creating a sixties and early seventies atmosphere; the compositions show Lambro’s evolution and creative process for a decade or so ranging from 1965’s Git! to 1972’s Mineral King.

Thinking of the sheer amount of movies that were scored from the last fifty years, there literally have to be tens of thousands of scores that have not made it to cassette, much less CD. Hopefully the sale of discs such as “The Film Music of Phillip Lambro” will ensure that Perseverance can continually purchase the rights to these old scores and release them for a new audience to appreciate. Lambro’s music during these films provided a much more nuanced approach to the soundtrack enterprise; it would be good exercise for any individual that is looking to score films in the years to come to pick this up and see how someone did it during the sixties and seventies.

Top Tracks: Distant Land (from “Celebration”), Miner’s Tune (from “Mineral King”)

Rating: 8.0/10