Film Music of Phillip Lambro

Best known for his classical works, composer Phillip Lambro had what Randall D. Larson, writer of the liner notes for The Film Music of Phillip Lambro, calls a "short but notable Hollywood film-scoring career" beginning with little-seen 1965 movie Git! (the soundtrack for which constitutes tracks 21-25 here) and including And Now Miguel (1966), Crypt of the Living Dead, Murph the Surf (1975), and Blood Voyage (1976) (the middle two issued on disc by Perseverance Records in 2006). In addition, he scored several documentary shorts, and this album contains music from three of them: Mineral King (1971; tracks one-eight) an environmental examination of plans by the Walt Disney company to develop a California valley into a ski resort; Father Pat (1970; tracks 9-16) a tribute to Father Patrick Peyton, coiner of the phrase "The family that prays together stays together"; and Celebration (1971; tracks 17-20), a study of American forms of celebration made for the United States Information Agency. Except for Father Pat, which used a 60-piece orchestra paid for by the Catholic Church, Lambro's scores for these films seem to have been constrained by small budgets, and he reacted by writing for few instruments (sometimes only one or two), and also by doing pretty much what he wanted. There are some lovely and imaginative themes here, sometimes played by a banjo, acoustic guitar, bass drum, or harmonica. There is little doubt that the composer is influenced by trends in modern classical music of the period, with atonal passages and unusual juxtapositions of instruments. Especially because the films are unlikely to be screened again any time soon (Lambro notes that Git! has made lists of the worst movies of all time), this is music that can be considered as part of Lambro's classical repertoire even if it is technically movie music.