Kingdom of Heaven

Review by Thomas Glorieux:

Hans Zimmer isn't a composer who wants to repeat what he just did, and Kingdom of Heaven, Ridley Scott's version of the crusades was too similar in style to Gladiator, so it forced a switching between composers. Harry Gregson-Williams left Madagascar and joined Zimmer's place instead, ultimately leaving Zimmer to battle with the tiny creatures in his place. Of course, any composer will easily prefer the scope and luring quality of Kingdom of Heaven over a computer animated movie, yet Zimmer as said didn't want to repeat his style. And Harry Gregson-Williams was simply putting his style in the mix instead. This resulted in a intruiging move for fans, and led to high expectations, to which many himself Gregson-Williams achieved successfully through his score here. Kingdom of Heaven is indeed a nice score, and the blending of the thematic solo theme and the choral beauty works for much smoother listening then say Gladiator. But fans of the heavy laden Gladiator will then think less of Kingdom of Heaven because its just well soft, and not attractive enough for a powerful listen. Both are wrong and right, but you have to say still that I prefer Zimmer's Gladiator more. Simply because I get more a vibe out of it, because it simply attracts my attention a little more. Of course Kingdom does it differently, and above all surprisingly softer, there is not one grand orchestral burst of action ala Gladiator, and that was exactly the change Zimmer wanted, Scott demanded and Gregson-Williams achieved. It starts with 'Burning the Past' and violin and choir setting the theme for the movie. Its not a theme that grabs you, in fact during the first listen you will simply listen over it, but its nice to see how easily it transcends to an Arabic like version in 'To Jerusalem' and to a nice song like dance in 'Light of Life (Ibelin Reprise)'. This theme actually shows many times its presence, its easy to start liking it, the moment you actually spot it in the track.

Despite the loveliness of the theme, the moments that do take on the attention are far more present in the second part of the score. In fact, this album only started to work for me after 'Rise A Knight' where the percussion leads to the orchestra and choral growth of something magical. 'The King' takes on the duduk, vocal and meandering orchestra, only to grow in the middle with the theme's louder version. As of action material you might wonder, well its not that loud, but the effect is surely there in tracks as 'The Battle of Kerak' and 'Wall Breached', the first presenting to show the choir with lots of darker qualities, and the way it rises alongside the orchestra showing the anger is very good. The brass and strings are angrier here too and works for the effect even more. The latter track has strong moments of the brass and choir instead. Occasionally you still feel the evidence of a Zimmer score in this, and 'Terms' and 'Saladin' have moments that could easily play for Black Hawk Down in return, but 'Terms' at least grows for the better sake in a percussion laden dance with choir, showing again the action motif with choir of track 10. 'Saladin' has after the ethereal calmness of the begin a string magic with variations on the theme, that show nicely how easily this theme develops and fools its existence. 'Coronation' is a heavenly choral piece while 'An Understanding' shows even more the liturgical and heroic growing color a choir and orchestra can achieve when they build up to their climax. And while as said the album starts to work only after about 9 tracks, the begin still has some nice moments with either the flute and fast strings leading to the theme in 'Swordplay' or the ethnic tones with the choral main theme in 'A New World'. Yet despite all its attractive moments and delights, Kingdom of Heaven is still for those who didn't like Gladiator that much, or in retrospect Gladiator will do perhaps more for people then Kingdom of Heaven. There will always be people who will like both, like one or the other or detest the 2. Yet both have their qualities as well, and Kingdom of Heaven has a great quality of leaving the listener not desiring more, because the lack of an outburst of large action music does work here, showing Harry Gregson-Williams was a profound choice of leading the musical direction into a different spin.

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Tracks

Single Disc

1. Burning The Past (2.48)

2. Crusaders (1.41)

3. Swordplay (2.01)

4. A New World (4.21)

5. To Jerusalem (1.38)

6. Sibylla (1.49)

7. Ibelin (2.05)

8. Rise A Knight (2.43)

9. The King (5.45)

10. The Battle Of Kerak (5.36) Excellent Track

11. Terms (4.29)

12. Better Man (3.29)

13. Coronation (3.03)

14. An Understanding (4.13) Excellent Track

15. Wall Breached (3.43) Excellent Track

16. The Pilgrim Road (4.07)

17. Saladin (4.44)

18. Path To Heaven (1.38)

19. Light Of Life (Ibelin Reprise) * (2.10)

* Featuring Natasha Atlas

Total Length: 62.11

The use of artwork or photos is posted for non profitable reasons

=== Link to Composer Site: Harry Gregson-Williams ===