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Filmtracks Recommends:
Buy it... at any expense if you want to enjoy one of Goldsmith's definitive, classic scores... perhaps the best sports genre score of all time. Avoid it... if the inspirational sports genre of scores, including Goldsmith's Rudy, doesn't inspire you. Filmtracks Editorial Review:
Goldsmith loves scoring the adversity of sports dramas, and when approaching Hoosiers, he had the additional challenge of augmenting the autumnal setting of Indiana in the 1950's. With a fully symphonic score expected by his fans, it was a complete shock when Goldsmith's end product for Hoosiers was a piece of music dominated by electronics. The fit didn't seem natural when mentioned by the word of mouth, and yet, when all was said and done, Goldsmith somehow managed to pull off the impossible. He single-handedly proved legitimacy for electronics in period dramas by composing and mixing one of greatest scores of all time. So natural is Goldsmith's music for the film that the listener is completely enveloped into the world of 1950's Indiana during the heartfelt scene of travel at the start of the film, without realizing that the score is electronically conceived and performed. That opening title cue, often heard at the end of the score's albums, is a pure melody of historic beauty, and helped launch the film and score from their opening minutes all the way to several Academy Award nominations. Some film music fans have gone so far as to argue that the opening five minutes of Hoosiers, with only the score heard with the visuals, is one the most impressively understated moments of score and film congruence ever. It's hard to disagree, though people who are fixated on the tender moments of the Hoosiers score forget that Goldsmith's innovative sounds during the climatic scenes on the basketball court are the true treasure. It's not often that even the greatest composers do what Goldsmith did for the game scenes of Hoosiers. He took the sound of a basketball bouncing off of a hardwood floor and mutated it into several variations, depending on how distant the ball was from the listener. He then utilized the main, up front bouncing ball for the majority of his beats in the score, and accentuated other moments dictating percussive beats with the other bouncing variations. The result is a powerful and bass-rich score that sounds strangely effective even though most casual movie-viewers don't clearly make the bouncing ball connection. Along with other tingling synthetic elements, including some straight forward keyboarding on his Yamahas, the electronics are accompanied by a full orchestra. The strings are consistently utilized in every cue, and brass are similarly woven into the percussive texture without obvious thematic duties. The score is, however, extremely melodic --almost to a fault-- but you can understand by the victory scene at the end of the finals why Goldsmith spent so much time building his themes up to that one, massively heroic statement of emotion. His handful of themes are remarkably interchangable, and all of them capture the spirit and charm of the team, its individuals, and community in Indiana. The performances of these themes offer the ultimate in major-key excellence, warming the listener's heart and begging for repeat listens. The score was never released on a fully commercial American CD. It exists as Best Shot on the European (U.K.) branch of the Polydor label (after all, who in Europe actually knows what a Hoosier is?) called "That's Entertainment Records," and is readily available at a slightly higher price as an import in America. A cassette was ironically released in America with the same contents and the correct Hoosiers name. Similarly, an identical CD album with the Hoosiers name came out of Japan in the mid-1990's. The pressings of these albums ranged from 1987 to 1995, so many copies of all versions are floating around the market, waiting for your enjoyment. The mixing of the albums is not the best, with the opening suite offering a sharp start, and several cues badly out of order and pieced together. Even though the sound quality of the recording is slightly dated in its analog master form, the electronics of the score are so dynamic that you will not notice that age to any great extent. The score is a prime candidate for eventual re-release in a proper, re-mastered form. It is one of Goldsmith's crowning achievements, a testament to the notion that you can take the wrong instruments for the job and make them work brilliantly. Not only should Hoosiers be the staple of any Jerry Goldsmith collector, it should be a top priority for all film score fans. The composer would reprise the same spirit in Rudy, with continued success, but he would not again realize the same sheer enthusiasm that was so evident and infectious in Hoosiers. It remains a modern classic. *****
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