Buy it... if you are considering your first purchase of any of the music from the first four television shows in the "Star Trek" franchise.

Avoid it... if you are more specifically interested in the music from "Deep Space Nine" and "Voyager," in which case the same label's follow-up album released in 2000 is a better selection of music.

Goldsmith
McCarthy

The Best of Star Trek: 30th Anniversary: (Compilation) One of the few enduring television concepts of our time, "Star Trek" consistently featured orchestral music above and beyond the call of duty. There are few modern television franchises that ever are afforded the kind of budget to secure orchestral scores anymore, and the continuing standard of significant organic music for all of the "Star Trek" shows has remained a treat for all of its fans (especially during the 1990's). On album, several of the scores for "The Original Series" and "The Next Generation" have been released on their own by the GNP Crescendo label over the years, leaving open the possibility of expanding into the later two series as they matured and ended. The best of the music from "The Original Series" and "The Next Generation" was released within ten years of the end of the latter show, feeding the shows' fans with a considerable amount of music from the most important episodes. Fans of "Deep Space Nine" and "Voyager" have always been disappointed, however, with the lack of continuing albums featuring music from the best of those shows (after 2001, GNP would largely cease their television music production, leaving subsequent releases in the franchises to several different labels). In 1996, however, to coincide with the much hyped album release of Jerry Goldsmith's score for Star Trek: First Contact, GNP Crescendo offered select music from all four television series on one album. It was the first time that all four titles themes from the existing franchise shows could be purchased on one product, and it included suites from episodic scores from all four shows as a bonus. Four years later, GNP would respond to pressure from fans and release a second compilation of a similar construction (and the second volume is an arguably better album, with more interesting music from the latter two series represented). Titled "The Best of Star Trek: 30th Anniversary," this first volume of "Star Trek" music offered the initial music available from the actual underscores of "Deep Space Nine" and "Voyager." It was also a relatively early venture into the realm of enhanced CDs, with much of the same material as contained on the concurrent Star Trek: First Contact album.

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Music from "The Original Series" goes largely ignored by most Digital Age film music fans simply because of its comparatively poor sound quality. Here, Jerry Fielding provides an inspired suite from the famous episode "The Trouble with Tribbles," which varies from his trademark Western styles for the bar fight scene to a wobbling brass effect for the sci-fi elements of the show. The two following suites from "The Next Generation" are the best on the album, with Ron Jones' introduction of Klingon music in the series taking snippets from both Goldsmith's theme and Horner's percussion in the feature films. The lengthy suite features slightly muddled sound quality, but it still presents an outstanding look into Jones' interpretation of the Klingons given limited instrumentation. A suite of specially prepared material from Jay Chattaway's score for "The Inner Light" provides the delicate flute performances so well remembered from the episode in which Captain Picard lives another lifetime through the probe of a dead alien species. The recording quality of this suite, thankfully, is superb. After an unfortunate "popified" version of the title theme from "Deep Space Nine" (are such mutilations really necessary to sell copies of these products?), Dennis McCarthy continues his presence with a suite from the award winning episode "The Visitor," an episode in which Captain Sisko is trapped in a temporal anomaly in the Defiant and an elderly Jake Sisko recounts his efforts to save his father. The more typical McCarthy approach to the modern series' scores can be heard here, with conservative, bland themes and short cue lengths. The title theme for "Voyager" follows, and it has disappointingly been artificially extended into its concert format. An exaggerated cut in the middle of the piece is painfully obvious, and fans may wish to seek the CD single of the theme (previously available) if only interested in this Emmy winning Jerry Goldsmith theme. The suite of music by McCarthy from "Voyager" is perhaps the most exciting of the composer's work, and both it and the suite from "Deep Space Nine" expose a side of McCarthy's writing that is equal to, if not more impressive than, his Star Trek: Generations film score. Overall, fans of "Deep Space Nine" and "Voyager" will be left still wanting more, and to that end, the second volume of "Star Trek" music remains a better purchase. Regardless of this fact, this compilation is an interesting and enjoyable album for franchise followers. ***   Amazon.com Price Hunt: CD or Download

Bias Check:

For Jerry Goldsmith reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.26 (in 113 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.32 (in 133,462 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.