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Review of The Woman King (Terence Blanchard)
FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:
Buy it... if intelligent blends of Western orchestral melodrama and
African percussion and vocalizations provide a distinct style you find
too rare in film music.
Avoid it... if thematic development in a truly satisfying narrative arc is your focus, Terence Blanchard struggling at times to explore his melodies in effective ways during his frequently sparse recording.
FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:
The Woman King: (Terence Blanchard) Despite
twisting history for the benefit of its narrative, the 2022 historical
epic The Woman King is among the most powerful and well-received
genre films of its generation, capturing a perfect blend of
socio-political interest and engaging action. It tells of the dominant
female warriors of the West African kingdom of Dahomey in the 1820's,
whose population was fighting the slave trade and the superior,
neighboring Oyo Empire. Against this backdrop is the film's family story
involving the lead warrior, the fictional General Nanisca, and her
training of and battles alongside her fighting force. A young warrior,
Nawi, is revealed to be her relation, and Nanisca uses all her knowledge
of life and the enemy, along with her closeness to the king of the land,
to achieve peace, victory, and a better path for Dahomey. Her exploits
eventually lead her to be crowned the "woman king" next to the actual
king. The movie was protested by some in the black community for
glossing over Dahomey's actual involvement in the slave trade despite
the British Empire's efforts to stop them by the mid-19th Century, the
king's character in particular re-written to make him more palatable.
Still, the movie received immense critical and popular praise, and while
it reaffirmed studio doubts by struggling to achieve the box office
success up front to cover its costs, The Woman King is the kind
of production that yields its best returns over time, especially once
awards consideration takes effect. Much of the positive response to the
movie has been aimed at its employment of music. Director Gina
Prince-Bythewood sought a very specific blend of Western orchestral
melodrama and West African authenticity in the work, all the while
employing black artists as much as possible. Her collaboration with
composer Terence Blanchard has long existed on screens big and small,
and his score for The Woman King is joined by original source
chants and songs written by Lebo M. and an existing pop song, "Keep
Rising" by Angélique Kidjo, for the end credits.
The Lebo M. recordings for The Woman King, made separately from the score, were presented to the cast and crew during shooting to provide as much authenticity as possible to the vocalizations seen on screen, a counterbalance to the fact that the dialogue in the movie is otherwise in English. These passages for a South African choir and percussion are therefore extremely raw, with a recording quality specifically constrained compared to that of Blanchard's score. (Anyone expecting something sounding remotely like The Lion King will not encounter such popified influence here.) Blanchard approached his work on The Woman King with awe for the picture. While he has tackled high-profile films and garnered major awards nominations, he didn't really prove his chops in the action arena until Da 5 Bloods in 2020. The extent of his planning for The Woman King is impressive, the composer combining the Royal Scottish National Orchestra with American jazz singer Dianne Reeves for specific vocal highlights and the nine-voice Vox Noire ensemble he had collaborated with on an opera for other vocals. A separate group of percussions was recorded for mainly the battle sequences, and Blanchard himself performed a metallic, African soundboard instrument called the kalimba. As an ensemble, this combination proves fantastic in its ability to represent all aspects of the tale and, of course, audience expectations. The composer weaves each of these elements amongst a few other notable accents, including some modern elements in the mix; electric bass, electric guitar, and synthetic effects contribute an almost timeless element, though one cannot help but think a touch of Quincy Jones figured into these stylings. The solo vocals by Reeves are key to the whole affair, her improvised performances sounding like a language but are instead created to fit the inflection necessary for each moment. Her contributions are sadly rarer than they probably needed to be for this score. Compositionally, Blanchard professed to being familiar with historical West African rhythms and harmonies via his relationship with other musicians. His writing for The Woman King is only as melodic as it needs to be for a basic narrative arc, though. Much of Blanchard's score is not concerned with advancing any structural element of his writing, whole sections of slower movement, such as cues from "To the Vector" to "Oyo Battle," accomplishing little narratively. When fully expressing his themes, the score often succeeds best, with several cues of remarkable power and even joy resulting from these performances. Still, Blanchard shows some limitation in his ability to manipulate his themes for different emotional situations, his main theme of the film needing transitioned from major to minor key at times, especially for the horror of "Nawi and Izogie (Part 2)," but the composer unable to make that shift. (In that particular case, the cue offers some marginal sadness but not any sense of dread or significant loss.) Also of interest is Blanchard's scope of the music, which is immensely broad but not necessarily deep. Don't expect all but a few moments in the work to achieve resounding resonance in the soundscape due to lack of counterpoint or a spread of instruments within the full range of the ensembles, especially the middle. Many of the work's short cues accomplish little more than ambient tonalities or percussive rhythms, few of which leave a lasting impact. While the recording for The Woman King may sound somewhat sparsely rendered in parts, it does strive to compensate with its compelling performance stylings and the themes it does employ. Blanchard's melodies in the score are highly inconsistent in how they are applied, some of them clear winners while others struggling to enunciate themselves in ways that really define particular concepts or characters. The composer, for instance, tends to apply fragments or only underlying chords to secondary ideas without providing enough reminders of the full melody to make such deconstruction potent. This challenge applies to Blanchard's four most prominent secondary ideas, as well as a slew of "one-off" melodies that he explores for singular scenes but never returns to. The main theme is less hindered by these difficulties, however, because it receives truly outstanding renditions in several cues and thus retains its powerful impact throughout. This primary idea consists of rising, three-note phrases over shifting chords, switching to descending equivalents for its interlude sequence. It opens "Agojie Return" in noble and optimistic form for full ensemble and accents and becomes playfully light on choir, percussion, and electric bass in "Agojie Training Montage." The main theme of The Woman King turns soft in the choral opening to "Nawi Trains Alone," switching to more uncertain harmonies at 0:14 into "Choosing Agojie for the Oyo;" In this harrowing cue, humming joined by improvised voice accents is joined by rare woodwinds that peek through in the middle. The main theme opens "Palm Oil" with optimistic jubilation on female voices, shifting nicely to cello. (This cue's tone amplifies the reasons for some of the controversy in the film's handling of the slave trade versus the kingdom's palm oil aspirations.) The theme eventually prevails over striking percussion action rhythms in "Final Test," gains leverage throughout "Oyo Battle" before finally prevailing, and explicitly returns in "Coronation." As the clear highlight for the orchestra, percussion, and vocals together in The Woman King, the main theme opens and dominates "The Woman King," a magnificent presentation that finally achieves true comfort in supplying each of its parts in satisfying sonic depth. The layering of "The Woman King" helps it reside among the best single moments of Blanchard's career, and it's the kind of finale cue that will appropriately attract significant mainstream attention, much like the closing of Ludwig Göransson's Black Panther. Even so, this arrangement does not address the secondary ideas of the work, which represents a missed opportunity to wrap up the score's loose ends. Blanchard's secondary themes in The Woman King are only present to the extent that they are basically necessary. The most significant of these ideas is also the work's most frustratingly unfocused, seemingly representing the Dahomey cultural identity. It is more lyrically dynamic than the main theme but starts with the same ascending phrase, most clearly developed through all of "Road to Abomey" in humming, Blanchard adding the orchestra nicely at the end. The underlying chords inform the quiet, regal tone of "Entering Palace" and occupy "The Kings Entrance." The theme does subtle battle with the Oyo theme in "Sometimes a Mouse Can Take Down an Elephant," tangentially informs "To the Vector," and opens "The Blade of Freedom" and "Oyo Battle" in subdued fragments. The performance in "The Blade of Freedom" and the middle of "There Will Be No Prisoners" does betray some influence from John Williams' Amistad. The chords alone return in the latter half of "The Final Battle" while the melody is tentatively stated throughout "Nawi and Malik" on choir and figures softly in the middle of "Coronation," the idea slight in the affable "Mother Will You Dance." The aforementioned Oyo theme for the neighboring villains is a somewhat meandering melody on menacing brass layers and low strings; many listeners will simply associate Blanchard's array of aggressively banging and clicking percussion with the Oyo. This material opens "Oyo Warriors to the Village" and stews in its melodic line later in the cue. It's developed further throughout "The Oyo Arrive" and fights against the heroic themes in "Sometimes a Mouse Can Take Down an Elephant." Bass strings carry the theme in "We Bring Tribute" under imposing percussion, and the idea eventually diminishes in "The Final Battle." Two even less cohesive themes are tougher to nail down. What sounds like a destiny theme is heard throughout all of "To Be Great You Must Focus," reprised in "I Have to Try to Save Her" on woodwinds and opening "The Final Battle" valiantly. A theme possibly for the Malik character isn't entirely clear in purpose, opening "Malik Arrives" with uncertainty and nervous percussive clicking, and variations are explored in "With One Purpose" and "Through the Jungle." Other singular ideas that Blanchard explores but never maximizes include one that opens "Nawi and Izogie (Part 1)," others heard late in "We Bring Tribute" and the latter half of "You Fought Well," and a particular solitary highlight for excellent improvisational vocals throughout "Whiskey for Izogie." The absence of larger purpose or clear organization to all of these wayward melodies causes some consternation for listeners not enamored solely by the scope of performance sounds in The Woman King. Those stylings are fantastic, and those who don't particularly care about melodic details will find the score to be a magnificent treat of performances spanning Western orchestral conventions and West African history. The recording's presentation is dry and does at times lack depth of layers, the absence of counterpoint lines a particular detraction. On its album, the 74 minutes of score spread over 38 cues isn't arranged for an optimal listening experience, those contents requiring rearrangement and combination for a half hour of very engaging highlights. For those who appreciate Blanchard's combination of Western and African styles in The Woman King, especially in the vocal lines, it's difficult not to compare this work to the obscure but fantastic and dynamic Elephant documentary score from Ramin Djawadi in 2020. While both scores offer the same general foundations, Elephant remains superior by a clear measure due to its better melodic development and remarkable depth of mix. That said, The Woman King is an admirable career achievement for Blanchard and provides its topic with appropriately intelligent dignity and scope. ****
TRACK LISTINGS:
Total Time: 82:33
* composed by Lebo M ** performed by Angélique Kidjo
NOTES & QUOTES:
There exists no official packaging for this album.
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