Press Release from Music Box:
In collaboration with Studiocanal and BMG, Music Box Records is proud to present a new album featuring two remarkable scores by Philippe Sarde: Music Box (1989) and The Matchmaker (Once I Was, 2010).
For Music Box, Costa-Gavras’s powerful political thriller starring Jessica Lange and Armin Mueller-Stahl, Philippe Sarde composed an austere and intense score. The music revolves around two central themes: Ann’s deeply melancholic theme and the music box theme — pure, almost childlike, like an ancient universal lullaby. Their variations intertwine throughout the film, heightening the atmosphere of tension and tragic revelation. This new edition benefits from a brand-new remastering.
For The Matchmaker by Avi Nesher, Philippe Sarde delivers a score of great delicacy for this nostalgic romantic drama. The film explores the silences of the past and the hidden wounds of love in 1960s Israel. The composer adopts an impressionistic musical language in which the orchestra unfolds like a symphonic poem. With few direct synchronizations to the image, it offers a resolutely melodic and atmospheric discourse, laced with subtle Yiddish inflections. This deeply humane score is available for the first time on CD.
These two works, distinct in their stylistic approaches, testify to Philippe Sarde’s sensitivity and mastery, equally capable of supporting an intense historical drama or an intimate, nostalgic chronicle.
Supervised by Philippe Sarde, the program has been assembled by Édouard Dubois and fully remastered by Christophe Hénault. The package includes a 12-page booklet featuring exclusive liner notes by writer Édouard Dubois discussing the films and the scores. The release is limited to 350 units.
