McNeely: Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire

Author's product rating:   

Originality	Definitely a cut above the rest
Lyrics	Not applicable
Quality and consistency of tracks	Flawless
Value for Money	Good

Advantages:	McNeely's take on Star Wars material is brilliant
Disadvantages:	None .

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

"A soundtrack for a Star Wars novel?"

At first glance -- or first listen -- it seems an odd idea. Scores are composed for movies, TV programmes, and sometimes stage plays. But for books?

Then again, quite a few classical music compositions are themselves derived from literary works. Tchaikovsky's "Romeo and Juliet" Overture was derived from Shakespeare tale of "starcross'd lovers," and Rimsky-Korsakov wrote his Scheherazade orchestral suite based on Tales of One Thousand Nights. So why couldn't there be a score for a Star Wars novel?

In 1996, even as the 20th Anniversary Special Edition of the Star Wars Trilogy was being prepped for release in early 1997 and pre-production planning for Episode I was starting, Lucasfilm gathered several authors, artists, and representatives from Hasbro and other licensees to discuss a huge multimedia project that was, in short, everything but the full-fledged filmed version of a Star Wars movie. The talented science-fiction writer Steve Perry was hired to write an original novel for Bantam Spectra that would be the core of the project called Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire.

The novel would be a stand-alone Expanded Universe novel, the first of the Bantam Spectra series to depict events within the Trilogy's timespan, i.e., between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. All the other products, ranging from Hasbro's Kenner Star Wars action figures to Nintendo 64 cartridges, would use Perry's novel as a starting point and expand the story somewhat, sticking to the essentials of the story of the Falleen crime lord Prince Xizor's scheme to avenge his family's death after a bio-warfare experiment directed by Darth Vader results in a lab accident, forcing the Empire to sterilize part of Xizor's homeworld by Star Destroyer bombardment. Xizor plans to bring Vader down in the most painful manner -- by killing the young Jedi Knight-in-training named Luke Skywalker, the most dangerous threat to Emperor Palpatine...and Vader's son.

Because Lucasfilm's directive was "Everything but the movie," one of the more interesting aspects of the Shadows of the Empire project was the commisioning of composer Joel McNeeley, who had already worked for Lucasfilm as the composer for the wonderful but short-lived "Young Indiana Jones Chronicles," a stint that earned McNeeley an Emmy for the score of "Young Indiana Jones and the Scandal of 1920." (McNeeley has also written music for many feature films, including 1994's Terminal Velocity and 1996's Flipper)

McNeeley's task to compose music for a Star Wars adventure -- even if it was literary rather than cinematic -- was daunting. John Williams' scores for the existing Trilogy are masterpieces of symphonic music and are immediately recognizable. How could McNeeley compose a score of his own that would build upon Williams' material yet be able to stand on its own?

McNeeley's approach was simple. Instead of following slavishly in Williams' footsteps, he'd use a few existing motifs to set the scene by borrowing Main Theme from Star Wars and grafting music from the Han-Leia farewell scene in Bespin's carbon freeze chamber (track 1, "Main Theme and Leia's Nightmare), then break away on his own as much as possible. And this he accomplished brilliantly, as listeners of this album will discover when they hear "The Battle of Gall" (track 2), "Beggar's Canyon Chase" (track 4), "Xizor's Theme" (track 6), or "The Seduction of Princess Leia" (track 7), a wonderful piece that starts out, as the title implies, with sensual undertones in a waltz-like movement with almost Max Steiner-like romantic phrasings that end abruptly with a shift to dark thematic material.

Obviously, this being a Star Wars story that is set while Vader is still alive and still in the thrall of the Dark Side, McNeeley can't totally leave out existing material by Williams. In addition to the mood-setting first track, McNeeley borrows two key Star Wars motifs in track 8, "Night Skies," which features both The Imperial March (Darth Vader's Theme) and Ben's/The Force Theme in a scene set on Coruscant's Imperial City as the Dark Lord senses his son's presence somewhere in the sprawling city-planet.

For the Varese Sarabande Digital recording of Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire McNeeley teamed up with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra and Chorus, an acclaimed ensemble of over 150 musicians. Acclaimed record producer Robert Townson, a fan of film scores and John Williams' Star Wars scores, helmed the project.