Composer Baptiste Allard is a new name for me, although I notice he has worked on a few movies, which include a score for a version of PAPILLON earlier this year for Italian television. His latest score is NOI ERAVAMO, and I must say it totally beguiled and enthralled me, it is a beautifully crafted score and one that is overflowing with delicate and fragile sounding tone poems which ooze emotion and are brimming with poignancy. I was surprised to learn that the score is made up of samples so no real instruments performing as it were, well I find this very hard to believe because the work is just so alluringly beautiful and possesses real heart and soul, the music is romantic, dramatic and haunting. The composer’s themes and musical passages infiltrate your mind and work away at your inner emotions at times leaving one a little exhausted but in a nice way. There is a light and subtle style present within the score that is laced with an air of the mysterious and maybe the magical. It is a work that I am confident will become a favourite amongst collectors and one that will be returned to many times once heard. There is just a sound to it that makes it attractive and comforting, piano and harp are utilised with strings also being a large part of the equation. I can’t really say this is a massive orchestral score because I know it is not, but the composer has fashioned a soundtrack that is so tender and so filled with emotive nuances and motifs that one would be hard pressed to say it was not played by an orchestra, he builds the work gradually and tenderly with woodwind playing its part alongside and underlining strings and brass sounds with percussive elements being added for the more dramatic and urgent sounding pieces within the score.
The title cue NOI ERAVAMO is actually track number 7 in the running order and is one of the longest cues on the soundtrack coming in at just over seven minutes, this I think is what one might call a slow burning fuse of a theme as the composer builds the cue layering strings over woods and adding percussion even thought this is subdued, brass flourishes are also entered into the proceedings to give it a more pronounced dramatic feel, but all the time we hear the strings which are underlining supporting and enhancing everything that is going on, the style employed is like a fusion of Thomas Newman and Ennio Morricone, so it is subdued but at the same time has to it a strong thematic presence that one cannot ignore.
Piano does feature predominantly in cues such as LUCIANO and LUCIANO and GUGLIELMO and returns in many the cues adding wisps of melancholy and at times infusing an atmosphere that is sombre and solitary. The composer also includes a fusion of horns and strings that are underlined and punctuated by percussion in cues such as PLANES, PLANES FACTORY, SOLDIERS DEATH, and VOLANTARI which is the final cue on the release. No stand out cues as all are very good indeed. I only hope that one day very soon this composer gets a film with a large music budget, then the end results I am sure will be powerful and beautiful. But for now, check this out, you will not be disappointed.
Track listing.
1
Opening
2
SoldIers
3
Agnese & Guglielmo
4
Blood Donors
5
Fiorello La Guardia
6
Injury
7
Agnese Bloody Clothes
8
Everyone Goes on Their Own Way
9
Hospital Arrival
10
Noi Eravamo
11
Luciano
12
Luciano & Guglielmo
13
Luciano’s Goal
14
Planes
15
Luciano’s Writing
16
Planes Factory
17
Reminds You
18
Solders’ Death
19
Takeoff
20
Travel Memories
21
Armistice
22
Volontari (Bonus)
MOVIE MUSIC INTERNATIONAL. (MMI) . 