The First Olympics: Athens 1896

Olympic history is always interesting to look back at. In the mid 80's a television miniseries chronicling the story of America's first major success in the Olympics was brought about. The project had been meant to be released years earlier, but the boycott of the Moscow Olympics had put a stop to that. For the music of the miniseries came the lesser known Bruce Broughton whose career was going to take off with Silverado the following year. Over 20 years later, Intrada released a highly comprehensive album that featured; the entire show's score and any material that could be considered source cues.

The entire first CD of the album contains the show's score, running about an hour. With a story set at not only the Olympics, but the Olympics in Athens, Bruce Broughton manages to tap into the perfect stlye. The introductory titles are what you would expect from an Olympic setting; bold and brassy with a fanfare style. For the location of Athens, there is alot of Greek flavor peppered in. To be honest, Broughton's scoring sounds very much like John Williams here, and that's not a bad thing. Many of Broughton's future styles (prominently for his Homeward Bound scores) are also featured here. Part 2's style is more developed here. It features more quiet moments and when it does bring out the main fanfare, it's done in an incredibly orchestral way.

The second disk on the album, running at about 50 minutes, features all of the source music that Broughton either arranged, adapted, or conducted. It includes; The March of Athens, Olympic Procession, The Bugles, American Hymns, and other background music for the miniseries. It is all recorded very well, and still sounds great over 20 years later. The second part of Disk 2 features the original Producer's 1984 Demo Suite which is mostly unique takes and special 24 track remixes. It's another great recording but nothing extremely new than what was presented before.

Overall, Bruce Broughton's score for The First olympics: Athens 1896 is fresh and broad. The sound of the score really reflects John Williams and Broughton's typical orchestral music. The album presentation is also very nice, complete with very detailed liner notes and descriptions for each track. The additional music is a nice touch as well, and for those obsessed with completing their scores, this is a perfect release.