YASUO HIGUCHI
Phoenix 2772
(火の鳥2772 愛のコスモゾーン Hi no Tori 2772: Ai no Kosumozōn)
Orchestra 2772
Orchestrated and Conducted by The Composer
Mariko Senju (solo violin)



1. Prologue - Birth
2. Trials
3. She
4. Adulthood
5. Love and Suffering
6. The Evils of the World
7. In Search of Salvation
8. The Merry Bunch
9. The Encounter
10. The Power Of Love
11. Return to the Earth
12. Destruction
13. Death
14. Rebirth

My Rip. Scans included.

FLAC (Mega) [Tangotreats' upload] - https://mega.co.nz/#!RlIw1LiQ!cVM3qCTvgc7hOAhPvm_NTiOF1MY7WXi9wbRZBMJ P1hc
FLAC (Mega) [Herr Salat's Mirror] - https://mega.co.nz/#!pMVWwaIb!CcaUmm5kf-EF4XfddR-8HEPx2vgSwUxIeGHWT3c0HVw

FLAC (Mediafire) [Herr Salat's Mirror] - PART 1 (http://www.mediafire.com/?843d0pk0k484k2j) | PART 2 (http://www.mediafire.com/?3u8spq9vbi6ozuf)


Tags in English as they are on the original Japanese release, for some reason.

Well, what to say about this? You'll just need to listen to it for yourself, of course, but I find this to be one of the greatest masterpieces of symphonic music. Yasuo Higuchi works infrequently, but when he does, magnificent things happen - and none of his scores are quite as magnificent as this one. He's the only composer who excites that same part of my musical psyche that Yoshihisa Hirano does - with a completely unique style, an orchestral technique to die for, and a flawless sense of melody. It's a sumptuous mix of very-late romantic theatrics mixed with tantalising modernism. It's also impossible to categorise - calling it a film score is doing it injustice, because it's really a symphony. On the other hand, it is a masterpiece of musical storytelling - so perhaps it's an opera without words.

Listen out for the beautiful violin solos, as performed by Mariko Senju (Akira Senju's sister).

I won't say any more - because this is a score to listen to and enjoy... And I hope you do enjoy this one - it's very hard to come by. The only rip circulating online is at 128kbps and features atrocious sound quality - even by 128kbps standards. It was pressed on CD in 2004 as part of the Animex 1200 series and sold out almost immediately; it's now impossible to find new, and almost impossible to find on the secondhand market. Bearing that in mind, I'm breaking my own rule on this occasion and providing FLAC - it's one of those scores that just deserves it, and since you can't just "go and buy it" it makes sense to try to circulate it in the best possible quality.

I have one favour to ask in return for uploading this; PLEASE SPREAD IT AROUND. Put it on torrent trackers, reupload it, post it to other forums, share it, get it out there. And try to make that awful 128kbps rip disappear, for the good of humanity. I want to get it up on BakaBT but I'm not a power user; anybody who is and can offer a torrent is more than welcome to. In short, put it anywhere and everywhere.

what a treat! =P

thanks Tango!

Thanks a lot and thanks for the FLAC. Time to archive..

FANTASTIC Score! Do not hesitate to listen to this one, you will not be disappointed (unless you want a zimmer synth/rock score).

thanks. Indeed, it is quiet a listening experience. :)

Thanks Tango...

=)

AWESOME

Thanks for the FLAC Version!

Thank you ! Thank you ! Thank you !

I have always wanted Phoenix in better quality, it is truely a masterpiece.
Where did you get your copy ? I've tried many times to buy this gem but all efforts failed.

Thank you very much.

Well, after all that competent praise I have no doubts that it will be great... thanks in advance, I look forward to this listening :)

Great! I've been looking for this for ages...
I really love the movie and looking forward to listening to the ost
Thank you! Tangotreats!

Wow, this is beautiful! I never even knew this anime existed, let alone that it has such an amazing soundtrack. Downloading the FLAC version for posterity... thank you for sharing! Will send this to all my music-loving friends :)

Re-up of tango's treat :'D

Mediafire
YH - Phoenix.rar (http://www.mediafire.com/?843d0pk0k484k2j)
YH - 2772.rar (http://www.mediafire.com/?3u8spq9vbi6ozuf)

or

Mega
https://mega.co.nz/#!pMVWwaIb!CcaUmm5kf-EF4XfddR-8HEPx2vgSwUxIeGHWT3c0HVw

thanks
!

Needs a reupload already, sadly.

Why does it? Both of Salat's Mediafire links are working.

Oh.. .so they are. I don't know why they weren't connecting before. Oh well, problem solved I guess!

thanks tango! really excited to hear this, I just got the "orientation" classical album you posted to the Big Orchestral Action thread, this is my first introduction to this composer, but I trust your very high praise for this score!

---------- Post added at 01:05 AM ---------- Previous post was at 01:03 AM ----------

actually, I can't get any of the links to work, any chance for a reupload? Thanks!

---------- Post added at 01:08 AM ---------- Previous post was at 01:05 AM ----------

nevermind, thanks Herr Salat!

My sincerest thanks to both Tango and Herr Salat. Like grizz I first heard the Violin Concerto from the vinyl post, and after loving it and hearing that this album featured a more elaborate orchestration, I had to listen to it. That was two days ago. I haven't stopped. This album is an impeccable delight from start to finish.

Why this post is almost two years old and has less than twenty replies and in three days a post with four hours of "The DaVinci Code" has over 150 is something I will never understand.

Also, for the curious, here is the opening of the film: Space Firebird 2772 part 1 eng dub - YouTube (http://youtu.be/Qlc70ihusac)

Simply a wonderful and charming marriage of sound and image, the like of which is far too uncommon today.

My sincerest thanks to both Tango and Herr Salat... ...Why this post is almost two years old and has less than twenty replies and in three days a post with four hours of "The DaVinci Code" has over 150 is something I will never understand.

Amen to all of that, my friend... but it doesn't surprise me at all. Complete crap has mass appeal. Let the rest of them have their Dark Knight, DaVinci Code, and Iron Man. I feel a special kinship with anybody who notices this thread and others like it. It is an exclusive club to which we belong.

The fact that it is indeed almost two years old, and nevertheless still generating interest... that's truly heart warming. Herr Salat told me he went off looking for Higuchi's music as a direct result of hearing this score, which led to his lucky acquisition of Orientation, which in turn introduced this album to more folk still. The circle is complete; a theme absolutely running through Phoenix 2772, one of the most perfect films I have ever seen... and that's before you consider the score, which elevates it immeasurably higher still. It would've been wonderful with no score at all... but coupled with Higuchi's spotless score, well, genuinely magical things happen. The opening ten minutes as you've observed; just a perfect example of music and imagery working together to achieve something that's many times the sum of its parts.

Two glorious minutes of an overture of sorts; nothing but soaring music and some of the most breathtakingly beautiful animation ever made (and all by hand) - followed by the introduction of the violin concerto against simple black-on-white credits. Then a glorious montage, meticulously edited around the concerto, telling the story of Godoh's youth in just five minutes without a single word of dialogue or a single sound effect. And then, as if that weren't enough, a splendid travel scene; a bit more art-department showing off (to think every frame of that sequence is hand drawn... simply mindblowing) set to Higuchi's bustling music. Eleven minutes and thirty-four seconds of the film pass before a single word of dialogue is spoken. Just magical.

All pales in comparison to the finale, though... which I urge you not to watch out of sequence - you need to see the whole film for its full impact to be felt - and which I will not spoil... suffice to say, it's another five minutes where dialogue and sound effects completely subside and hand over the storytelling exclusively to Higuchi and to the animators. The score - and the film, and the very essence of life itself - comes full circle and if you're not in floods of tears by the time the end credits roll, you're just not human. A reprise of the violin concerto accompanies the end titles, which play against a beautiful sunrise - the music builds to a romantic, major key crescendo, with a final full-orchestra statement of the violin concerto's central melody, and so ends a genuinely magnificent film.

If anybody is interested, I have almost finished a restoration of the film, which I have been quietly working on since posting this thread in April of 2011. All previous DVD releases have major flaws. I have based my restoration on the Region 4 Australian DVD which is slightly less bad than the others, and done a frame-by-frame restoration and full colour grade. Sound has also been significantly remastered (although the audio - mono and very much a product of early eighties Japanese optical recording technology) and there will be an isolated score as much as is practical, due to the fact that there is some music missing on the OST and some cues have been edited quite significantly or tracked from other parts of the film.

I have also significantly edited and re-written the subtitles - which are absolutely atrocious.

I'll make a note when it gets released. I'll try to get it up on Nyaa somehow.

I'm definitely interested in your restoration of the film :'D

Started editing for the isolated score track yesterday. Crikey, this is hard work. So many minute edits. I will only attempt to re-create film versions of cues where to not do so would cause "scheduling problems"... for example, if I left the first track as the album version, it would over-run by almost a minute and as a result bang into the "Travelling" cue... which also needs to be cut, otherwise it would again overrun and unwittingly score a tense conversation scene with upbeat, bustling action music.

Thank you for your hard work! :'D

Eagerly awaiting your restoration of the film, Tango.

Coming along quite nicely. About three quarters through the subtitles last night. The official subs seem to be written by somebody who has challenged themselves to type as little as humanly possible whilst still vaguely conveying meaning. It's clumsy and minimalist, full of grammar failures, and at times almost completely nonsensical. They are also very literal - in places where a bit of interpretation would really ease flow and clarify meaning. In a few places, I've thrown away the literal translation in favour of my own interpretation, and in places I have substituted ideas from the English dub; the dub itself is monstrously bad, but the script is surprisingly good.

You know you're in trouble when the character speaks about twenty-five words of Japanese at a frenzied pace, rolling his tongue, spitting with venom, and obviously swearing every other word... and the subtitles say "You're mean."

"Pico", Mariko, "Goddo"
Source (http://anonym.to/?http://www7b.biglobe.ne.jp/~pianissimo/bio.html)

Fascinating! Mariko is (was) cute. :D

I would seriously sell my testicles for Higuchi to write something new. It's the height of cruelty that he hardly ever works. Ditto Yoshihiro Kanno.

.

YASUO HIGUCHI
Phoenix 2772


Can this be reploaded? Perhaps to Mega? Cheers.

Edit: Oops, hehe ^///^ Appears to already be on MF.

Thanks, people.

.

Right, time for a Higuchi-gasm...

Yasuo Higuchi actually scored the full trailer for Hi No Tori 2772, completely to picture - and recorded it with the same ensemble that performed the film's score. Holy crap... THIS is music, folks... The whole story told in two minutes and twenty seconds of completely fluid, goosebumps-inducing glory. The trailer began with one exchange between two characters, and then this music started... and played out with only one word of dialogue to interrupt it (near the end - edited out here). Brave. Jaw-dropping. Higuchi's score carried that trailer all on its own, no SFX, no chatter, no crappy pop music... Just a stunning whistlestop medley of all the major themes of the score.

This guy is a genius. Seriously.

I've extracted the music from the trailer and performed a bit of a restoration. It still sounds like shit. I don't care. I'd listen to this music if it were on Edison cylinder. Enjoy! :D

Yasuo Higuchi - Space Firebird 2772 (Hi No Tori) - Trailer Score.flac (http://www.mediafire.com/?15t83xmjg9m5qad).

Added MEGA link for the score in FLAC. :)
Also added Herr Salat's MEGA mirror link, which I hadn't spotted until I'd already uploaded mine... Oh, well... the more the merrier...
...and finally Herr Salat's still-alive Mediafire mirror.

Removed all other links as they're dead.

MP3 and AAC versions can kiss my chuddies.

Thanks tangotreats and Herr Salat.

Wonderful, thank you Tango.

Thank you Tango and Herr Salat for the re-upload. As a basis of curiosity, have you thought of doing a Yasuo Higuchi Discography thread over in the Movies/Television/Classical music download thread, if it's not too much to ask? All you would really have to do is simply link this thread (and any other thread of Higuchi's work uploaded by you and Herr Salat.)


NineEye9Nines

Not from me. I feel it wouldn't be enough with what we have right now. I would love to have more orchestral scores and classical works by him first.

Many, many thanks for this rarity and I'd love to get other works by this composer!

thanks

thank you

Great upload! :D
Thank you so much tangotreats and Herr Salat!!!

I stumbled upon this thread almost by accident, figured I may as well give it a shot (I've never seen the anime) - and fell in love with the score almost immediately! Thanks for sharing this marvelous work, in lossless no less.

Thank you, tangotreats, for bringing us forth this masterpiece.

I gave this a listen after Tango listed it as his #1 favorite soundtrack of all time, and I'm not disappointed. On a technical level, it's absolutely marvelous. The usage of dissonance surpasses even that of Hirano. And the orchestral textures that flow nonstop are inventive and exhilarating to listen to. That this kind of music was ever even put into a film at all is a miracle in and of itself.

With all that being said, I can't bring myself to love this. While it is technically amazing, I feel almost nothing emotionally from it, like most modern music. Its rush of nonstop orchestral textures, while exhilarating, is also exhausting to sit through, like a nonstop parade of sugar that repeatedly hits you until you have diabetes. And the underlying music, while inventively orchestrated and developed, never amounts to anything more than the usual Mickey-Mousing themes of the old Disney cartoons that Tezuka is so fond of. I had a similar problem with Asakawa's Kimba, another Tezuka adaptation, which also had jaw-dropping orchestration and thematic development marred by the Mickey-Mousing style of the work.

Having not seen the movie myself, I can't say I've given the soundtrack the most fair assessment. But generally, the best soundtracks tend to be capable of telling the story on their own, and occasionally outright surpassing the film it was made for. I can understand why this would suit the tastes of someone like Tango, but it crosses my tolerance threshold.

Still, everyone should give it a listen- it's an experience you won't forget anytime soon. That the rips are still up after all these years is also a miracle in and of itself.