Psycho: The Complete Original Motion Picture Score [Soundtrack]

Psycho (Related Recordings), Bernard Herrmann, Joel McNeely, Royal Scottish National Orchestra | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (July 29, 1997)
• Original Release Date: June 16, 1960
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Soundtrack
• Label: Varese Sarabande
• ASIN: B000001502
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (38 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #52,355 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #94 in Music > Pop > By Decade > 1950s

Track Listings

1. Prelude

2. The City

3. Marion

4. Marion and Sam

5. Temptation

6. Flight

7. Patrol Car

8. The Car Lot

9. The Package

10. The Rainstorm

11. Hotel Room

12. The Window

13. The Parlor

14. The Madhouse

15. The Peephole

16. The Bathroom

17. The Murder

18. The Body

19. The Office

20. The Curtain

See all 40 tracks on this disc

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Much has been made of composer Bernard Herrmann's choice to use only razor-sharp, slashing strings for his score to Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho. And heaven knows it works like a dream (or a nightmare), the music feeling as edgy and colorless as the noir-ish black-and-white photography. But as noticeably effective as the knife-screeching violins are in the famous shower scene (followed by those deadly blows from the basses and cellos), they work just as powerfully--though perhaps not as noticeably--all throughout the picture. Herrmann evokes dread and tension with just a few notes, or captures Janet Leigh's flighty panic in pizzicato as she hits the fateful road to the Bates Motel after impulsively stealing a large sum of money from her employer. --Jim Emerson

Product Description

No Description Available.
Genre: Soundtracks & Scores
Media Format: Compact Disk
Rating:
Release Date: 29-JUL-1997

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

33 of 36 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Finally Free Of The Fruit Cellar July 27, 2002

By M. Packo

Format:Audio CD|Amazon Verified Purchase

First of all, for all of those who have whinned
about preferring an "original" soundtrack recording
-- forget about it! Was never made; never will be.

The 1975 Unicorn-Kanchana recording, conducted by
Bernard Herrmann, (the 1989 cd is a VERY difficult
import to acquire) has been the definitive version of
the entire soundtrack -- until this 1997 recording.

Much as I respect many of Danny Elfman's original scores -
particularly Dolores Claiborne, Black Beauty, Mars Attacks
and even the amusing MIB II prelude - his treatment of
Herrmann's masterpiece is only a nice try.

With all that out of the way, and after considerable time
spent comparing the recording Herrmann finally had the
opportunity to make shortly before he died, (which I have
been listening to regularly for over 25 years) with McNeely's
version which I have been avoiding for a few years, my advice:

This is now the definitive version and will likely remain
so for decades. Barring a much needed remastering of the
Naional Philharmonic-Herrmann cd, you will NEVER hear this
score, which is simply one of the finest musical compositions
of the 20th century, the way it must be heard.
Depth, clarity and separation between the various strings -
particularly the celli and basses - is exceptional. Like
listening to the music for the first time! The prelude has
most - though not quite enough - of its frenzy back. The
two missing cues are very interesting and most welcome.
There is a nice inversion at the start of The Window which
makes it more interesting. Every track is engineered impeccably,
with a nice sustain and ring-off to the strings just the way
it ought to be. Originally I found certain cues, like The City,
The Curtain, and even The Water uninspired, too measured and
lacking spirit. Likewise, I still find Herrmann's conducting
usually has more of the flow and flavor of the music's essence
which McNeely sometimes seems to lose track of. However, the

overall dedication to craft and total respect for the quality
of this score is perfectly obvious. I regret having waited so
long to purchase this recording.

Lastly: The liner notes, though decent, really deserved to be
more detailed and technical. You can hear maestro Herrmann
doing such simple yet sublimely subtle things with his score
now, and it would have been so helpful for us non-musicians
if there had come included a bit more explanation as to what
compositional elements they are.
And why not have a companion video recording of this
recording session?
Now THAT would finally free Herrmann's masterpiece even more
from its neglected past!

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Herrmann's Famous Score Complete on CD November 22, 2004

By NMdesapio

Format:Audio CD

My favorite classic movie scores are Leonard Bernstein's for ON THE WATERFRONT (1954), Alfred Newman's for THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK (1959) - and Bernard Herrmann's for PSYCHO (1960). Herrmann composed his all-strings, "black-and-white" score at around the same time he wrote the hauntingly beautiful music for such memorable episodes of THE TWILIGHT ZONE as "Walking Distance" and "The Lonely." The parts of the extensive PSYCHO score that stayed with me most after seeing the movie for the first time were the "flight" theme (when Marion Crane, after having embezzled money, is fleeing in her car from the police); the "temptation" theme (heard as the camera focuses on the stolen money lying on Marion's bed); and, of course, the squealing violins of the two famous murders: Marion's (in the shower) and Detective Arbogast's (on the stairs). All of that music - and in fact, the entire movie score - is captured vividly in this 1996 recording by Joel Mc Neeley and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. The recorded sound is spacious, the strings lush in the almost-Romantic "Marion" and "Marion and Sam" themes. So great is the PSYCHO score that it fully deserved this complete, modern recording. Let's hope that Mc Neeley and his orchestra record Herrmann's TWILIGHT ZONE themes, too.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Definative April 12, 2004

By Pat Harris

Format:Audio CD

Spectacular re-recording of what remains one of the most recognizable and imitated film scores of all time. As usual with McNeely and the RSNO, the performance is both electrifying and exact, and the recording is spot on. Herrmann felt that Hitchcock's black-and-white film needed an equally black-and-white score, so he removed the "color" from the orchestra by limiting his writing strictly to the string section. What he accomplished was amazing in its ability to manipulate one's primal emotions, with or without the film. From the panic-stricken opening titles, through the long passages of drawn-out suspense, to the famous murder "stings," few other scores have done so much to build and shape the overall mood and movement of a movie. This completed Herrmann's trilogy of masterpieces for Hitchcock films, the prior ones being 'Vertigo' and 'North by Northwest.' If the former was his most darkly romantic, and the latter his most light-hearted and adventurous, then this one is easily the bleakest and most relentlessly single-minded. Yet it holds up splendidly as a stand-alone piece of work, brought to life once again under McNeely's direction. I'm not usually a fan of re-recordings, but he and the RSNO seem to get Herrmann's work just right time and again. A must-own if you love film music.