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I have been affected in a positve way by this composer and believe you cannot expect to listen to a Mark Mckenzie Score and not be affected in the same way by its emotional pull or tug at your heart.
This is the seventh score I have reviewed of his and all seven are exquisite in their orchesration but even more so in their melodic content. McKenzie gets his hook into a score as soon as he knows what the story is and never lets us forget what he has for us expressing exactly his interpretation of the story with his music - his heart to ours. His creativity in this aspect of any score I have heard of his are unparalleled among his peers.
Among his work, his score for "The Blizzard" is brilliant,(not easy to come by), but if you can get it, well worth the money,"The Last Sin Eater", "In From the Night" which is on the same disc as "Silver Bells" both Hallmark made for television movies, "Durango", "The Lost Child", (expensive but again worth the purchase if you can find it), and his latest CD released on January 15, 2008, Saving Sarah Cain.
The composer usually works with large orchestras but this score is produced buy some of the musicians of the Los Angeles Studio Orchestra. In the liner notes there are thirty one strings, encompassing violins, cellos, violas and basses, a smaller ensemble than usual but their music is quite amazing.
Most of the works of McKenzie I have reviewed are melodic and "Saving Sarah Cain" is another beautiful, listening experience. This is a story about an Amish family torn apart by their mother's death and Sarah arriving at her sister's funeral suddnely wondering about herself now the legal guardian of her sister's five children. This is also the most "tender" score I have listened to of McKenzies describing it's parts both happy and sad and we are left to marvel at his writing.
Mark McKenzie seems like a great cabernet, while getting mature with age his melodic work is velvet to the ear now and his orhestrations pull everything together like a great wine and it's elements on the palate. McKenzie orchestrates so beautifully that when a change takes place the listener will either never notice or wonder how he pulled off the transition, perhaps in a listening moment alert to a change but having to replay the cue to get it once again to be sure.
There is not a single instrument or group of them he cannot equate into part of the whole. In the wondrous sound of his scores the transitions will make you think about how he did it - the segues so obvious to him but to the listener, introductions of a lovely choir of strings, french horns a subtle oboe solo or soft piano are - wow!
Mr. McKenzie worked extensively with, before the untimely death of, in my opinion, one of the top three best soundtrack composers to date - Jerry Goldsmith, gaining immeasurable experience from a master, orchestrating for and with Jerry some of the best scores ever. You cannot go wrong here. Mckenzie is on his way to being a major talent in the industry.
Cain is an A+. There are three vocals which are yours to grade.
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