The Spanish animated film, The Little Wizard, tells the story of Bieito Dubidoso, the titular little wizard who uses his powers to save his father's life from the Normans. The evil Bishop Juan believes that the boy has dark powers and does everything to get rid of Bieito and his friend, Destreza. The music for The Little Wizard was written by Spanish composer Marc Timón Barceló who makes his CD debut with this release. The soundtrack also features contributions from co-composer Miguel Cordeiro...

Marc Timón Barceló and Miguel Cordeiro's orchestrated score for The Little Wizard is a surprisingly intricate work of art - packed full of emotional themes.

Personal highlights include: 'The Little Wizard (Main Theme)', which gives a quick nod and a wink to John Williams's music to the Harry Potter movies; 'Snow Spell' which packs just about every style of theme into its short running time - from action/chase to beautifully melancholy love theme; 'Sarah's Poisoned Witchcraft', which had segments in that reminded me of both Trevor Jones's score for The Dark Crystal (1982) and Ed Welch's music for The 39 Steps (1978); 'Auto-da-fé' has a short segment in it that reminded me of Beethoven's 'Allegretto' from Symphony No. 7 in A major, Op. 92; 'The Final Battle' is packed full of action and adventure themes; and 'Dubidoso's Mother' has arguably this score's most beautiful theme at its core.

If beautiful, emotionally charged scores are your thing then The Little Wizard has exactly what you're looking for. This is well worth adding to your soundtrack collection.

9

Darren Rea