Intrada Soundtrack Forum

As it's now more than 20 years since Varese's (nearly?) complete release of this landmark score, could we benefit from advances in restorative audio technology to come up with an even more sonically rewarding incarnation? (Considering La-La Land's recent release of THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK, and especially their previous remastering of THE ROBE, I would not be surprised that this is a title, only one of two Academy Award wins by the composer for "Original Dramatic Score", in their sights.)

Unfortunately, we know that the Disney empire's relatively recent acquisition of 20th Century-Fox has complicated future licensing of Fox material. What's more, already there's been discussion elsewhere of how LLL's CD set for DIARY OF ANNE FRANK features a producing credit for the late Nick Redman... which is a major clue to how long the FRANK package had been in the works before its eventual release.

I don't know whether THE SONG OF BERNADETTE is a property that Varese had licensed in perpetuity. But unless some label had initiated work on a new edition well before now, chances for an expansion from anywhere are probably slim.

Varese's presentation from 2001 had a running time of 104 minutes. I'd be content with a re-issue of this program (hopefully with improvement in sound quality). In terms of expansion, however, I'm not aware of an official CD release of the program released by Decca/MCA in 1944 (though I would not be surprised if it had appeared in Japan). While originally issued as a set of four 78's, it was subsequently transferred to LP in several incarnations over the years. (I suspect this performance was specially created for disc, but I could be wrong.) At about 25 minutes, the suite could be added to the original tracks and, as a double CD, the total time would still be only about 130 minutes.