Buy it... if you seek a softer, classically-inclined companion to the best-selling "Cinema Choral Classics" album of equally impressive sonic marvels.

Avoid it... if you would prefer the more thunderous, wall-rattling selection of battle hymns and chants on that previous album.

Cinema Choral Classics II: (Compilation) After the first "Cinema Choral Classics" album from 1997 exceeded 70,000 units in sale and reached the top 15 on the Billboard Classical Crossover Charts, you knew that a sequel was inevitable. Over the following year, the album set records for compilation sales in the soundtrack genre, both in traditional stores and online. Garnering enormous critical praise by various classical and film publications outside of the constricted world of film music, "Cinema Choral Classics" promised of subsequent efforts by The City of Prague Philharmonic and the Crouch End Festival Chorus. The ensembles were, by 1998, at the height of their film music reproduction efforts, with Silva Screen's releases of their performances serving as the very best film music recreations available on the market. Like the previous entry in this particular series, Silva had managed to avoid the three major pitfalls of any re-recorded film music compilation: lack of orchestra size, lack of choral accompaniment when the original recording featured one, and poor recording quality. It's not often that a label and performing group avoids all of these sins, but Silva has done just that over the past ten years with their magnificent compilations. When the ensemble is large, the chorus is even larger, and the sound quality is in at least Dolby Surround quality, you can forgive even the occasional performance mistake or questionable adaptation, both of which are inevitable in any compilation. That leaves the selection of included pieces to solely determine the worth of any album for the particular listener. In the case of "Cinema Choral Classics II," Silva's offerings feature a more distinct classical influence than the previous album, including classical pieces that happen to appear in (or are altered to be effective in) motion pictures. Add to that a healthy variety of Patrick Doyle works, and the product is one that certainly belongs in the classical section of your local stores. The majority of tracks on the album still, however, are film music based. It just so happens that Silva took all the monumentally huge choral pieces and expended them on the first entry in the series. In light of this transition to softer selections, the cover art could be a tad misleading.