August 5, 2022
Expanded CD Reissues of Ennio Morricone’s RED SONJA & Georges Delerue’s DAY OF THE DOLPHIN
Quartet Records of Spain, in collaboration with Studio Canal, presents an expanded, remastered edition of Ennio Morricone’s classic fantasy sword-and-sorcery score for the Arnold Schwarzenegger vehicle RED SONJA (1985), directed by Richard Fleischer and also starring Brigitte Nielsen as Sonja.
Initially conceived as a kind of continuation of the Conan saga started three years earlier by the same producer, Dino de Laurentiis, the original idea was to tie in Sonja’s character with the rest of the Conan universe and create a trilogy featuring the hulky Cimmerian. But the picture eventually became just a loose appendage to the franchise, although it kept the same director as CONAN THE DESTROYER and Schwarzenegger as the main star.
Ennio Morricone, who took over after Basil Poledouris scored the first films, provides a powerful and exciting score dominated by an epic march as the main theme, far away from the Poledouris style. The score also features a beautiful love theme, fierce action cues, adventure music and dark and mystical passages.
RED SONJA was originally released by Varèse Sarabande on an LP (and later on CD) featuring two extremely long tracks labeled “Symphonic Suite for Chorus and Orchestra – Part I & II,” although the music was organized like a regular album – just without separate track titles. In 2010, Perseverance Records released a new edition of the CD, cutting up the suites into tracks and organizing them into mostly chronological order, but not adding new material. This new edition contains all the music from the original album program in stereo (also reorganized in film order) and then the complete score in mono (from the only elements available). Both versions of the score have music that’s not heard in the other – for instance, the main battle theme from the album (“Fighting the Soldiers”) is never heard in such a developed version in the film, while other bits and pieces (like the music for Varna’s escape) were not included on the previous album. By combining the two programs, this is as complete as RED SONJA can get.
Produced, restored and mastered by Chris Malone, the package comes with a 16-page full-color booklet including in-depth liner notes by Gergely Hubai discussing the film and score. Two-sided cover art features the original poster and the new one created for the 4K restoration in 2022, both designed by artist Renato Casaro.
Quartet Records has also released a remastered reissue of Georges Delerue’s 1973 Academy-Award nominated score for the Mike Nichols classic sci-fi paranoia thriller THE DAY OF THE DOLPHIN, starring George C. Scott, Trish Van Devere and Paul Sorvino, about a marine biologist who teaches his dolphins to communicate in English, but shady characters plan to kidnap the trained mammals for a more sinister purpose. The acclaimed French composer Georges Delerue provides an impressive score with a bittersweet main theme, lyrical music for the dolphins; and subdued, tense music for the conspiracy. The original 35-minute album was released in 1974 by AVCO and then twice again on CD in the nineties in Japan, with a limited edition complete score from Percepto Records in 2008. For this new edition, Quartet includes both the original album assembly and the film score, which present different mixes and cues of different lengths. The album was produced, restored and mastered by Chris Malone from the original album masters and recording session tapes and include a 16-page full-color booklet including an in-depth essay by Jeff Bond about the film and the score.
Quartet Records has also released a remastered reissue of Georges Delerue’s 1973 Academy-Award nominated score for the Mike Nichols classic sci-fi paranoia thriller THE DAY OF THE DOLPHIN, starring George C. Scott, Trish Van Devere and Paul Sorvino, about a marine biologist who teaches his dolphins to communicate in English, but shady characters plan to kidnap the trained mammals for a more sinister purpose. The acclaimed French composer Georges Delerue provides an impressive score with a bittersweet main theme, lyrical music for the dolphins; and subdued, tense music for the conspiracy. The original 35-minute album was released in 1974 by AVCO and then twice again on CD in the nineties in Japan, with a limited edition complete score from Percepto Records in 2008. For this new edition, Quartet includes both the original album assembly and the film score, which present different mixes and cues of different lengths. The album was produced, restored and mastered by Chris Malone from the original album masters and recording session tapes and include a 16-page full-color booklet including an in-depth essay by Jeff Bond about the film and the score.
To order see Quartet Records.
