Compared to Horner's other lyrical children's themes, the main identity for The Land Before Time is a bit anonymous, but the orchestration of the theme's statements, as well as the very good mix of the choir, elevate this one beyond most of his others. Its performance at 0:31 into "Sharptooth and the Earthquake" is fairly standard in the score, the twinkling bed of percussion underneath a nice effect. The second half of "Sharptooth and the Earthquake" is one of the score's primary action pieces, often using a motif for the Cera character from the 3:00 mark onward. Meandering between major and minor key, this idea's performances at 3:50 by flute and choir are quite intoxicating. Sharing most of its timpani-rumbling, snare-ripping, and cymbal-crashing qualities with Willow's numerous similar cues, the later parts of this cue have pieces of chime-banging, rhythmic bombast from Brainstorm as well as a foreshadowing of tension heard later in Apollo 13. Despite its adequacy, the brief action music in The Land Before Time is its weakest element. The restrained beauty of "Whispering Winds" offers the score's most prominent use of the journeying theme shared with the song. Aside from occasional, light romps, this 9-minute cue is a seamless performance of the theme in the most innocent sonic capabilities of the woodwinds and choir. One fascinating aspect of this cue is a descending bass string rhythm under piano and meandering choir in three sequences that could trick some casual listeners into thinking they were listening to Danny Elfman's Edward Scissorhands. Horner uses metallic percussion to simulate the sound of wind in much the same fashion as in Willow, but not as prominently. An ensemble choral performance of the theme at the end of the cue is not to be missed. One of the few reprises of the noble dinosaurs' theme from the opening cue is provided at the outset of "Foraging for Food," a cue that thereafter gives the playful character motifs some quality, light-hearted airtime. A pan flute rhythm provides a unique variant on this material. If you're adverse to tingling triangles or despise Horner's sometimes wild percussive rhythms that build to an ambitious crescendo as in Bicentennial Man, then avoid this cue.

The Cera material receives a somewhat intrusive counterpoint brass motif at the outset of "Journey of the Dinosaurs" in The Land Before Time, the descending brass idea humorous but distracting, but the idea offers some pretty moments later in the cue before it closes out with some Cocoon-inspired exploration of the main journeying theme. The counterpoint overlay of the main theme and Ducky's motif early in "Separate Paths," joined by celeste, is outstanding. Further bursts of the Lightfoot and Tree Star material follows, though the journeying theme remains dominant. A triumphant brass and layered string performance of the journeying theme opens "The Rescue/Discovery of the Great Valley," leading to a brief action sequence that soars with harmonic spirit most similar to The Rocketeer. Both the Cera and Tree Star motifs figure into these passages. As the dinosaurs reach the Great Valley, their overarching noble theme from the start of the score returns with a softer, more elegant rendition at 6:08. As anticipation of the arrival builds, snare rhythms once again reminiscent of The Rocketeer eventually yield to a final, cymbal crashing ensemble performance of the journey theme. The idea's choral interlude provides a joyous conclusion that develops into an enthusiastic end credits cue that summarizes only parts of the score. A flourishing string rhythm propelling the start of the cue recalls An American Tail, underlining the score's most ambitious parade of character motifs in all their upbeat glee. After about two minutes, the journeying theme plays to the end with performances very similar to those that came immediately before in the finale of the film. A portion of the Lightfoot motif is indeed sequenced as a formal interlude to the journeying theme by this point, paving the way for similar placement in the song, which, not surprisingly, largely replaced the "End Credits" cue by Horner in the film. This piece remains somewhat dissatisfying anyway, as the lack of a statement of the dinosaurs' noble theme from the start is a huge disappointment. Instead, Horner extends the journeying theme to unnecessarily dull lengths at the end of this suite, time during which he could easily have wrapped up the score's other themes in their entirety.

Aside from the arguably lackluster conclusion to the score, The Land Before Time is an otherwise outstanding children's genre work that is always a joy to hear on album. The Dianna Ross song is not offensive, though it's somewhat predictable given Horner's usual song adaptation habits, and Will Jennings' lyrics are embarrassingly atrocious. The instrumental backing for this song consists of light rock elements only, with a distracting woodblock effect; for this film, a solid string section was merited at the least, if not a full orchestral ensemble. The massive symphonic ambience of the soundtrack as a whole is perhaps its best attribute for the casual listener. Horner's long cues and countless takes of each one allowed the musicians to really emote in their performances; the London Symphony Orchestra proves its credentials in these regards as not a single major flub is to be heard. Even aside from the clear and potentially obnoxious Prokofiev emulations that will raise memories of "Peter and the Wolf" without fail, The Land Before Time is among Horner's most "classical" scores, not just in the length of his cues but in the smooth development of each idea for great lengths. The work does have a few well-placed synchronization points, blasts from brass that unsettle the listening experience, but they are not frequent. As one might expect, the editors rearranged Horner's score in the film to better hit points as needed. The original 1988 MCA album, despite being readily available in the 1990's, became quite scarce in the 2000's. It surveyed all of the score's highlights but was missing two long cues for the middle third of the film. The duo of "Journey of the Dinosaurs" and "Separate Paths" are the highlight of Intrada Records' 2020 expansion of the score to include its entirety, and while neither cue has the singular highlights of the others, they are more than worthy additions, each with lyricism and action. The sound quality is remastered as well, the woodwinds especially brought to the forefront beautifully. It's rare to encounter a limited expansion of a soundtrack without alternate takes, however; Intrada's album offers only the formal presentation of the score and song. Ultimately, among the plethora of animated genre film scores that Horner composed over the earlier years of his career, none was able to recapture the consistent majesty and beauty of The Land Before Time. Along with Willow, it stood easily as one of the top highlights of 1988.  *****   @Amazon.com: CD or Download