Performed by The City of Prague Philharmonic

                      The Crouch End Festival Chorus

Conducted by Nic Raine

Produced by James Fitzpatrick

            Silva Screen Records
 

     Star Trek compilation albums, like their James Bond counterparts, have pretty much been done to death over the years. Granted, there will always be those newcomers to the soundtrack scene who simply want a nice album that packs the highlights from one franchise or another (that's were I started out at least), with time for the actual nuances of each score to come later (along with the cash flow necessary to support it). Of course, as new material arrives, new compilations are released to encompass it. While there has been plenty of Star Trek material to be found on previous Silva compilations, and while this isn't the first compilation album to focus on the this particular franchise, it at least supports the music all the way up to Jerry Goldsmith's score to Nemesis, and even tries to include some off-the-beaten path cues that attempt to make this album stand at the top.

     The performances from the City of Prague Philharmonic (and the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra on the opening track of the first disc), are solid and genuinely capture the overall feeling of the material, in glorious Dolby surround sound no less. Nic Raine, whose work on the Bond compilation albums has been top-notch, seems just as able to handle the work of Goldsmith and Horner. To hear some of this material in the quality that is on this disc is a real treat and, if that is what strikes your fancy, you'll find it here in abundance. Of course, the downside is that anyone who's already familiar with the scores (and who owns most of them at this point) will not find much to be excited about. The Bond albums rectified much of the problem by including unreleased material, and that made those albums a wonderful purchase. While much thought has been put into the cues presented here, there isn't much to be excited about, aside from a few gems.

     Of course, the title themes of the different series that have spun off of the original Star Trek are pretty much mandatory, but this album goes where pretty much no generalized compilation album has gone before by offering material from selected episodes of  The Next Generation (and not the Inner Light suite) and Deep Space Nine as well. While this is welcome, I found the actual tracks themselves to be rather bland and forgettable. I was highly disappointed that the selection from the original series was the over-performed suite from The Cage (not The Menagerie as suite is generally credited...for you purists out there). The Bird of Prey Decloaks cue from Star Trek III is also another welcome addition, and it was very interesting to hear a re-recording of Horner's chaotic Klingon motif. The main theme to Starfleet Academy was also nice (though it had previously appeared on the Space 3 Beyond the Final Frontier album). However, the real highlight has to be the suite of music from Nemesis, which is nicely arranged and manages to hit all the high marks from that score. Everything else is old hat, and the end credits music from The Motion Picture, The Final Frontier, First Contact, and Insurrection follow the same basic format that feels like a continual retread of the same material, albeit with different moments in-between the title themes

    For Star Trek fans, this is a solid compilation album, though it may lose a lot of its appeal to those who already have invested a sizeable fortune in the actual score releases themselves. For those interested parties however, Nic Raine and City of Prague Philharmonic have delivered a nice selection of Trek goodness.

Disc 1

1 - Star Trek: The TV Series Theme (2:23)

2 - Star Trek: The Motion Picture End Titles (3:53)

3 - Star Trek: The Motion Picture Klingon Attack (5:23)

4 - Sound Effect - Warp Drive (0:46)

5 - Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan Overture (6:34)

6 - Star Trek III: The Search for Spock Bird of Prey Decloaks (3:36)

7 - Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home End Titles (3:34)

8 - Sound Effect - Away Team (0:54)

9 - Star Trek: First Contact End Titles (5:11)

10 - Star Trek: The Next Generation Tasha's Farewell (9:14)

11 - Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Theme (3:54)

12 - Star Trek: Deep Space Nine He's Toast (3:40)

13 - Star Trek V: The Final Frontier End Titles (4:07)

Disc 2

1 - Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country End Titles (6:31)

2 - Star Trek: Voyager Theme (2:00)

3 - Sound Effect - Battle Stations (0:31)

4 - Star Trek: Generations Overture (4:41)

5 - Star Trek: Deep Space Nine One Last Visit (3:11)

6 - Star Trek: Insurrection End Titles (5:06)

7 - Sound Effect - Dogfight in Space (1:29)

8 - Star Trek: The TV Series The Menagerie (8:29)

9 - Star Fleet Academy Opening (4:03)

10 - Sound Effect  - Crash Landing (0:47)

11 - Star Trek: Nemesis Suite (7:43)