Steven Price — Gravity (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
This is one of my favorite film scores of all time. I put it on often and can still feel the emotions tied to each song ten years later.
Steven Price is from Nottingham England and was born in 1977. His first feature composition was for 2011’s Attack The Block Dir. Joe Cornish. He would score one more film before landing the job for Gravity (2013) Dir. Alfonso Cuarón. While he was set to assist with music design for three weeks, he inspired Cuarón so much he was hired on as the primary composer. To set the score apart from traditional action music, the two agreed there would be no traditional percussion, using the ambient sounds of explosions in the film to punctuate moments. Eschewing conventional film orchestration, the pieces of the score were filmed in smaller groups to manipulate the end effect to be more immersive. The 16 track final product received universal acclaim and went on to win the Academy Award for Best Original Score.
The entire score of this film does a remarkable balancing act. On the one hand the music does an amazing job of conveying the vacuum of space and the silence which comes with it. On the other, each note is loud and direct. The music forebodes an ethereal and heavenly presence while also displaying true chaotic franticness. The only negative to this score in this format is I have to interrupt it three times to flip and or change the record. The stand-out song on the album is Shenzou* (*sic). All themes converge in a tense fashion as our protagonist attempts to re-enter Earth’s atmosphere. Tight string music leads the song and soon gives way to angelic vocalization which also carries into the climax of the final song and title track. The voices are loudest here as the protagonist takes her first steps of the whole movie and her new life under the full weight of gravity.
Must Listen To: Shenzou
“Alright the way I see it, there’s only two possible outcomes. Either I, make it down there in one piece and I have one hell of a story to tell. Or I burn up in the next ten minutes. Either way whichever way, no harm no foul.”
