Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000 Film) | Tan Dun, Yo-Yo Ma, ...

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000 Film) | Tan Dun, Yo-Yo Ma, ... | A Beautiful Portrait of Eastern Legend

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Crouching Tiger, H...

	Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000 Film) Tan Dun, Yo-Yo Ma, ... Sony, 2000 average customer review:based on 100 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

The classical works of Tan Dun typically fuse compositional elements from the East and the West, but for his soundtrack to Ang Lee's Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, musical cultures aren't so much blurred as coexistent side-by-side. While the magical martial arts film doesn't boast music as stunning as its visuals, this soundtrack is still beautiful and elegant, a perfect complement to the movie's mysticism. Just don't expect epic, John Williams-inspired bombast here. On "A Wedding Interrupted," the riveting brass and string section introduction segues into soft-hued meditations; "Night Fight" boasts spiky percussion but sounds more reminiscent of Stomp than a kung-fu scene. That said, Dun's understated score--filled with Asian instrumentation, Romantic cello solos from Yo-Yo Ma, and a token theme song with vocals by Asian pop star CoCo Lee--is still a fascinating listen. Fans of Ma and Dun shouldn't pass this up. --Jason Verlinde

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The Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon Movie soundtrack

Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon..... What can I say? I loved the movie (a bit TOO much) and I will never fall out of it. But, you can't have an outstanding movie without outstanding music, and this soundtrack is THAT music. It's the Chinese cultural flavor that it brings that makes it so nice to listen to. Something different for a change. This soundtrack is awesome.

A Beautiful Portrait of Eastern Legend

What a great score! Tan Dun has proven he can score with the best of them with this score. Yo-Yo Ma is at the top of his game, ripping out beautiful cello solos nearly every track. One of the scores' greatest triumphs is it's constant atmospheric bliss. "Through the Bamboo Forest" is one of the best atmospheric suspense tracks I've ever heard, and "A Wedding Interrupted" swells into one of the greatest emotional moments I've ever heard on a score.

A must buy for score fans!

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Get aboard some cloud in a silky sky

The cello is the voice of mystery, of depth, of secret and dark caves in the mind of the living, in the memory of the dead. The cello opens the door to the other side of today, here, now, me, to the other side, virtual or real, virtual and real, of what our five senses can capture and even what our mind, the sixth dimension of our sixth sense, can perceive and conceive. When Tan Dun adds to this voice from beyond the grave and the fire of some terrific dragon his own sense of being within and without, inside and outside Chinese music or western harmony, he can reach the power of thunder and the speed of lightning as well as the delicate falling and landing or morning dew on the light leaves of grass that pierce the dawn with their green blades. He is unique at creating an atmosphere that will evoke the long-toothed tiger in the strong-fanged dragon and the fire-spitting dragon in the fiery fire-eating tiger. Even percussions become something unforeseen, unbelievably surprising in that trip to the exotic unknown and to the undecipherable emotional. Have you ever hovered in the dainty light lacy clouds that so artistically hang on the misty flanks of Chinese mountains ? If you haven't you will probably not recognize the cello climbing from one bunch to the next, up up and away into the vapoury sky of silky blue. Tan Dun is able to use all western musical instruments and techniques not to westernize Chinese music but to make western music sound just as much Chinese as if it had always been and born within the Great Wall of China.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University of Paris Dauphine & University of Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne

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Something different for your CD shelf

OK, I'm not going to get into some weird debate about how this instrument is actually Tibetan or this pentatonic scale is actually more Japanese or some such. I'm just gonna fire from the hip on this one and say that shortly after it's release this hit my stereo quite a bit when I wanted something different to flush my ears out with something different. It actually played a heck of a lot at my place because it's very exoticness (to my ears at least).

On the positive side here is that exoticness, the use of instrumentation not overly familiar to Western ears. Also the restraint of the score itself is pleasant and actually reinforces the restraint shown by the characters themselves in certain situations of the film, where due to culture and societal pressures certain things are just not possible for them. Further, the inclusion of both English and Mandarin versions of A Love Before Time was at the very least a bit of a curio.

But ultimately it is the haunting use of cello that captured my imagination so, it so perfectly captures the tone of certain of the films events and the use of it during so much of the movie also set the film apart from it's competitors.

On the downside it must be admitted that there is sometimes too much restraint shown in the score for the music to stand as brilliant entertainment in it's own right. One of my parameters for giving a soundtrack five stars is very much how well it stands up to being listened to in its' own right. Here the music struggles to achieve that goal in places. Also the motifs to me come across as a bit weak and not so signature. But that is probably just me.

All up a good buy, something with a touch of difference to it. No liner notes though full credits and a few nice photos in the booklet finish off the package. Get it cheap and enjoy.

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nothing special