Delerue's title theme for The Black Stallion Returns is among the composer's best, which is high praise for a man who made a living out of writing attractively elegant themes. This one is particularly long and fluid, surprisingly malleable in its translation from its major key fanfare mode into the minor for solo woodwind expressions of despair. His display of mastery in the title theme is twofold; first, the opening prologue and title cue offers a superb lesson in tempo. After the flute performs the theme in almost double time, the full London Session Orchestra kicks in with a performance of the same theme at a grand and considerably slower pace, the transition flowing seamlessly. The other mastery of Delerue's primary string theme is the aforementioned, occasional insertion of minor key interludes into its progressions. He had a knack for writing incredibly enticing and sorrowful themes by doing just this throughout his career, though there is nothing downbeat about The Black Stallion Returns. A secondary theme for the tribal allies in Africa occupies many of the bass woodwind solos throughout the score, erupting into a full action motif of great diversity in the race sequences late in the film. Other motifs exist for the main villain (a brutish, simple progression on snarling brass) and the boy's journey (heard in a full, concert-like arrangement complete with victorious interlude in the clipper travel scene). The latter theme, only conveyed twice in the film, is remarkably similar in style to Basil Poledouris' epic drama themes of the era. In its whole, Delerue's score certainly has its slow moments, but its momentous and gorgeous themes, led by the overwhelming title identity, alone carry the weight of the entire recording. Although The Black Stallion is remembered by far as a superior children's film, The Black Stallion Returns is a score that makes the original sound like child's play. Due to the restraints placed on the team of composers and musicians of the original project by their director, this is not as much a comment about their abilities. Instead, their last minute efforts simply cannot compare to Delerue's talent for these kinds of beautiful productions. The Delerue score was highly requested on CD by countless film music collectors for decades. It had existed on a rearranged LP album at the time of its debut, though it especially had been desired in the digital medium since the mid-80's.

Disappointingly, The Black Stallion Returns never showed up on Delerue's best known compilations of re-recordings either (a curiosity, given the great affection for the score from the composer and crew members on its recording), making it an even greater request from his fans. A Prometheus CD release of 2001 (a non-club/non-limited entry), in special coordination with MGM, provided both scores in the franchise with satisfying attention to detail. The music, identical to what had appeared on the LP, was remastered for that CD release, though Delerue's original recordings always sound fantastic. In 2009, Intrada Records expanded the offerings for the Coppola and Delerue scores, each limited to a scant 1,500 copies and immediately in high demand. While there wasn't as much from the sequel score to add (in comparison to the monumental expansion of the first score and all of its alternate recordings), there are a few highlights in the film version of The Black Stallion Returns to take note of, namely a few strong variations on the title theme (including one short choral accompaniment removed from both the film and original album). Interestingly, because the masters were handled differently between Prometheus and Intrada, the recording does sound quite a bit different. The 2001 album emphasized certain parts of the ensemble over others, reducing the influence of some of the composer's background flourishes. But that 2001 product aided the scope of the music by presenting it with more thunderous reverb. Intrada's album gives it a more intimate sound, allowing for greater appreciation of the technicalities but losing a bit of the grandness of the score's scale. Anyone dissatisfied with the complete score's dry presentation will be happy to find that Intrada included the former album mix on the same CD, and die-hards could probably achieve the best of both worlds by simply adding a bit of their own reverb into the complete score's mix. For listeners unable to affordably obtain either of the scores in the franchise, the 2001 album remains a strong compilation. On that product, it's difficult not to dismiss the original The Black Stallion score after one casual listen, skipping almost immediately to the second half as many others will do. Delerue's relatively short score (and one could say either version of the final 8-minute track alone) is easily worth the price of the album. If Filmtracks were to ever somehow develop into its own small island nation, then Delerue's theme from The Black Stallion Returns would be an irresistibly tempting national anthem.  *****   @Amazon.com: CD or Download