Yo-Yo Ma - Yo-Yo Ma Plays Ennio Morricone
Artist: Yo-Yo Ma
Title Of Album: Yo-Yo Ma Plays Ennio Morricone
Performer: Yo-Yo Ma, Gilda Buttà
Orchestra: Roma Sinfonietta
Conductor: Ennio Morricone
Composer: Ennio Morricone, Ennio / Tommasi, Amedeo Morricone
Year Of Release: September 28, 2004
Label: Sony
Genre: Classical, Violoncello
Quality, Bitrate: MP3, 320 kbps
Total Time: 56:08
Total Size: 128.17 Mb
Ennio Morricone is well-known to moviegoers. His soundtracks for The Mission, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, Once Upon a Time in America, Cinema Paradiso, and others are invariably warmly melodic and superbly suited to the films they grace. They not only add atmosphere; they help tell the story. For this CD Morricone has created new orchestrations for many of his scores, adding a solo cello part for the indefatigable Yo-Yo Ma, whose musical curiosity seems to be endless. Outside the films, these pieces tend to be lovely melodies, mostly pretty sentimental stuff, and, in the best way, gorgeous aural wallpaper. The most moving are the two selections from The Mission, but fans of Morricone's music will find plenty to enjoy here. Ma's playing, as always, is exquisite---warm, deeply felt (given the circumstances), and entirely idiomatic within the context. Perhaps not quite for the classical music lover, but an affectionate reworking of music by an important film composer. --Robert Levine
Roma Sinfonietta Orchestra
Sure to remain a top seller on the classical charts for some time to come, Yo-Yo Ma Plays Ennio Morricone is a new installment in the great cellist's long series of crossover albums. It diverges from most of the others, however, in its collaborative aspect: the music's original creator, Morricone, had as much to do with this album as did Ma and his creative team. Morricone's career in film music began during the era of the spaghetti Western in the 1960s and has flourished ever since, on both sides of the Atlantic. Morricone and Ma met at the 2001 Academy Awards, where Ma was performing and Morricone was nominated for his score to Giuseppe Tornatore's Malena. They hatched the idea for this album together, and all the adaptations of Morricone's music are his own. He also conducts the Roma Sinfonietta Orchestra.
Overall, the results are gorgeous. Morricone opens and closes the album with pairs of excerpts from two individual films, The Mission and the rarely seen The Lady Caliph. In between are four suites of excerpts, three of them associated with Morricone's favorite directorial collaborators (Sergio Leone, Brian de Palma, and Tornatore). These suites, comprising varied but closely related stretches of music, really allow Ma to go to town. He has rarely achieved a more lushly beautiful tone or a more direct emotional appeal. Morricone deftly adapts his music for the cello-and-orchestra combination. At different times, Ma's cello plays the role of another solo instrument (the pan pipes in the Mission score, for instance), sings the wordless vocal lines that populate many of Morricone's scores, or plays lines of orchestral counterpoint that are elaborated into some pretty fancy fingerwork.
The only complaints pertain to the selection of music, and it's debatable whether there's really anything to complain about. Represented here are Morricone's big, romantic scores, mostly of fairly recent vintage. Cinema Paradiso, two cues from which are included, is an example casual filmgoers may be acquainted with. The edgier, more experimental scores Morricone wrote for Western and suspense films are ignored, and it was these that endeared the composer to scenesters like John Zorn, who recorded a memorable deconstruction of The Big Gundown some years ago. On the few tracks where electronic elements are introduced, they aren't well integrated into the general concept. As a whole, though, the album hangs together wonderfully, and the music can stand up to anything in the current neo-Romantic rage. Play the "Cockeye's Song" cue from Once Upon a Time in America for classical purists unfamiliar with Morricone, and ask them to guess the composer. Watch them squirm. And then introduce one of the great composers of our time, presented by one of our foremost interpreters.
-James Manheim
Tracklist:
1. The Mission: Gabriel's Oboe
2. The Mission: The Falls
3. Giuseppe Tornatore Suite: Playing Love from The Legend of 1900
4. Giuseppe Tornatore Suite: Nostalgia from Cinema Paradiso
5. Giuseppe Tornatore Suite: Looking for You (Love Theme) from Cinema Paradiso
6. Giuseppe Tornatore Suite: Malena (Main theme)
7. Giuseppe Tornatore Suite: Remembering (Ricordare)
8. Sergio Leone Suite: Deborah's Theme from Once Upon A Time In America
9. Sergio Leone Suite: Cockeye's Song from Once Upon a Time in America
10. Sergio Leone Suite: Main Theme from Once Upon a Time in America
11. Sergio Leone Suite: Main Theme from Once Upon a Time in the West
12. Sergio Leone Suite: Ecstasy of Gold from The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
13. Brian DePalma Suite: Main Theme from Casualities of War
14. Brian DePalma Suite: Death Theme from The Untouchables
15. Moses and Marco Polo Suite: Journey from Moses
16. Moses and Marco Polo Suite: Theme from Moses
17. Moses and Marco Polo Suite: Main Theme from Marco Polo
18. The Lady Caliph: Dinner
19. The Lady Caliph: Nocturne
On this CD:
The Mission, film score Gabriel's Oboe
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
The Mission, film score The Falls
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
1900, film score Playing Love
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
Cinema Paradiso, film score Nostalgia
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
Cinema Paradiso, film score Looking for You
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
Malèna, film score Main Theme
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
Una Pura formalità, film score Main Theme
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
Once Upon a Time in America, film score Deborah's Theme
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
Once Upon a Time in America, film score Cockeye's Song
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
Once Upon a Time in America, film score Main Theme
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
Once Upon a Time in the West, film score Main Theme
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, film score Ecstasy of Gold
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
Casualties Of War, film score Main Theme
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
The Untouchables, film score Death Theme
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
Moses the Lawgiver, television film score Journey
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
Moses the Lawgiver, television film score Main Theme
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
Marco Polo, television mini-series score Main Theme
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
La Califfa, film score Dinner
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
La Califfa, film score Nocturne
Composed by Ennio Morricone
Performed by Roma Sinfonietta
with Gilda Butta, Yo-Yo Ma
Conducted by Ennio Morricone
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