Search - James Horner :: Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius [Original Motion Picture Soundtrack]

Casual of pace, endlessly nuanced and often elegiac in tone, the game of golf is hardly the stuff of sure-fire Hollywood box office. Writer-director Rowdy Herrington's biopic of legendary links boy-phenom Bobby Jones (who retired at 28) turns instead on the inner demons and driving compulsion that made Jones arguably the greatest golfer in history. This interior-out approach requires a deft hand in scoring, and veteran James Horner imbues his cues here with a graceful, impressionistic restraint that recalls some of Rachel Portman's similarly shaded work. The composer's musical motif for Jones is a rising melodic figure for orchestra that shines with courage and resolve, one Horner returns to frequently in a score that manages to fuse traditional ethnic motifs with a modernist's pastoralism, traditional scoring foundations with contemporary pop vibrancy. The opening "St. Andrews" immediately sets the dramatic tone, interweaving Horner's main theme with fiddle and pennywistle flourishes, all the while stirring up a decidedly brooding undercurrent. "Destined for Greatness" weaves the ethnic touches into a rich interplay of themes powered by a Vangelis-like rhthymic urgency, while "A Win, Finally!" marches them proudly front and center. Music for most sports dramas rises to thunderous crescendos in their moments of ultimate triumph, but the triptych of cues that close this one find Horner digging ever deeper into Jones' complex soul with fragile, introspective music that serves as a tender, bittersweet elegy for the golfing great. --Jerry McCulley