Customer Reviews

Dirty Harry (Score) - O.S.T.

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Like many others of you out there, I've waited an absurdly long period of time for the complete OST album of Lalo Shifrin's Dirty Harry score to be reissued on CD. Collecting OST's can be exasperating because record labels tend to keep them in print for relatively short periods of time compared to other albums, and even classic scores can take years--or even decades--to be reissued. Over the past few years, I've watched the last few of my favorite "lost" scores to be reissued on CD--including Leonard Rosenman's Fantastic Voyage and Beneath the Planet of the Apes; and Komeda's Rosemary's Baby (although the latter is absurdly overpriced)--and, since Dirty Harry is one of my all-time favorites, I suppose it is fitting that is the last one to "fall" from my list.

I'm not going to pretend that Dirty Harry is "high art," but imo it is the best "cop flick" ever; and it has elements of a good psychological thriller to boot...then there's the atmospherically creepy night scenes, perfectly accented by Shifrin's eerie score.

It has been menioned by reviewers of this album, and the less-than-satisfactory Dirty Harry Anthology, that some of the best moments have been left off of previous albums bearing excerpts of this score: the crucial "Dawn Discovery" and End Title music have not previously appeared on CD, and the Main Title music only appeared as a "bleeding chunk" excerpt. This album is not missing any of the essential cues, and anyone who is a Dirty Harry buff, or just a movie score/OST album buff will find everything they've been waiting for right here.

If you like the music heard in the original Dirty Harry film - you will certainly like this CD - it has every composition on it (including the songs with vocals played in the background during the movie), and all songs are played in its entirety, (bonus songs are cool too, they fit nicely at the end)- and the sound quality is great! A definite must for anyone who appreciates original soundtrack music. (Lalo Schifrin's 1971 score influenced so many composers who followed, akin to what Ennio Morricone did with the spaghetti westerns.) And by the way, the first 2 songs on the CD is EXACTLY what you hear during the opening scene/credits to the film! Awesome!!!

I've never written a review on here, but I had to say something about this Dirty Harry album... After searching for the complete soundtrack to this film and buying other albums that came up short, I was very pleased when I accidentally stumbled over this one. After listening to it, it's obvious to me that this is THE album to get. All the tracks sound like they've been remastered. the music and the vocals sound crisp and like they were recorded yesterday. Every song for every scene is in here... This isn't one to pass up!

This is the actual music from the Dirty Harry movie. I must admit that this means the album contains a lot of material that I now never listen to. Small incidental pieces that work in the context of the movie, but do not make good general listening material in my opinion.
Having said that, there are about six tracks that I absolutely love that make the purchase worthwhile for me. Expensive ? Yes, but you can't get this music any other way. I started learning the drums as a young teenager after falling in love with the main theme. I'm now 45 and still drumming.
Another odd little tip for parents with young kids. If you ever organize giant family games of "hide and seek" in the house, or run around snipeing each other with plastic toy guns, then this CD provides a great backdrop. Just programme in the half dozen really good tracks and set it on repeat. The tension and excitement in the music makes a boring old game quite exciting for the kids (and the parents).

With every track of this cd it provides a mental image of that particular scene in the movie (for those of us who have a good memory). I highly recommend this cd for any Dirty Harry fan.

I am totally biased. First off, Dirty Harry is one of my favorite movies. I can't tell you how many times I have watched it.

The movie is almost realistic as a cop movie. Harry actually gets hurt, for example. But this is not a review of the movie.

One of the reasons I love the movie is because I love the music. I am an unrepetant rock fan. From Rolling Stones to Nine Inch Nails. And jazz often bores me.

But not Lalo Schifrin, for some reason. For much of my adult life, I did not know who he was. I slowly realized that some of the scores of movies I loved were from one guy, Lalo Schifrin.

The opening track is amazing. Filled with suspensful energy. Great Rhodes piano. Interesting drum fills. I can't put into words how amazing I think it is. It stands out from so many instrumental pieces. Maybe it's just me, I don't know.

I had to own this CD.

You gotta take a big hats off to Lalo Shffrin. The guy was using deep funk in film scores in 1967, when a lot of film scores were still using Lawerance Welk shadings. Listen to his work on Cool Hand Luke and Bullit. Only Quincy Jones could compete with him, and compairing those two composers is like putting Lennon and Mcarteny into a compositional boxing ring.

Dirty Harry is some of the deepest funk Lalo ever did, and it has an amazing impact: He does not use funk as "stock music.' This stuff is deep, gutsy, and driven. At times the music here rocks as hard as any Hendrix or Funkadelic album.

Shafrin also adds lots of dark orchestral shadings. Strings and flutes simmer dangerously and SNAP: The gun pops and your in a deadly funk interlude. He is a master of nuance and knows how to shift your emotions. The ochestrations are also amazing: they creep you out as much as Scorpio does in the film, like a lit match in a pitch black room of dynamite, but never get in the way of the funk's lethel propulsion.

One crisizim: There are a few vocal numbers on here put smack into the middle of the CD. They are good songs, but they break the flow and tention Shafrin's funk scrore creates, almost ruining the mood of the album. I understand whoever sequenced the tracks probably wanted to adhere to the order they were in in the movie, but watching a film and listening to a CD are two totally different experiances, even if listening to the same music.

That said, CD players are programmable, and this is a CD you absolutely will be playing a good deal.

Acid jazz is the best way to describe Harry Callahan soundtrack music. The Enforcer and Magnum Force on CD would complete the package. This is the essential Dirty Harry music CD for your collection, but tracks 3,4 and 13 are not worth listening to. Hurry, turn that one down too!

Director Don Siegel's "Dirty Harry" - along with John Boorman's "Point Blank" - are two definitive classics in the action/crime-movie genre of the 1960s & 70s. Now that the original score for "Dirty Harry" finally has been made available, one can truly hear how essential composer Lalo Schifrin's music is for the overall impact of this extremely intense movie. Schifrin's urban sounding, rhythmic, jazzy and once in a while avantgardist, tracks give real punch to every scene of the film, being also highly listenable as such, separated from the visual context. Like many of the best film music, this score also is a unified whole. As such it is best appreciated when listened from start to finish with no breaks. Both the movie and its score are as fresh today as in 1971 when they came out. Schifrin's mastery as a film composer is evident, as he has integrated his music so perfectly into the storyline of "Dirty Harry" that you only realize how great this score is when you listen to it just as such, without the images. A landmark score in the film music history. The auditive quality of the original session tapes is very good, too.

This a great soundtrack as the movie was. I've so glad its on CD and i wanna all the other soundtracks of his Dirty Harry Series of movies on CD.