One of my favorite things to cover in my weekly film score review is compilations. These sets are the most easily digestible forms of film music, and represented my entry into the world. It was the combined ‘Best Of’ albums of John Williams, James Horner and Danny Elfman that captivated me so much as a child. Now I take great pleasure in shining a light on these sets today, hoping that some non film score fans give them a shot.

In the world of film music compilations there is a top dog who has been releasing stellar sets over and over again. Silva Screen Records has been nailing it with re-recorded compilations of some of today’s most recognizable franchises. Mostly using the excellent City of Prague Philharmonic, these sets have been some of the most fun I have been able to review in my many months of writing about film music.

Today’s set is no exception, The Complete Harry Potter Film Music Collection is a well crafted, well performed and generally a great listen from start to finish. The set smashes together musical highlights from the eight film series that takes you on a journey from the optimistic sense of wonder in the first film all the way through the dark and dangerous end. It is a musical time-capsule that follows the decade long franchise.

For several years now the modern iteration of Doctor Who has been a high water mark for genre television. Upping the ante with incredible writing, good budget effects and a group of actors that would put most prime time line-ups to shame.

Among this mountain of quality is also the superb musical scores Murray Gold has written for the series since it returned in 2005. The Doctor has always had one of the best themes in the history of television, but what Gold has been able to do is add so much life to the show by crafting complex themes and ideas that span across entire eras of the show.

The last two seasons have been the era of Moffat and Smith, who together have reformed the show into a stylistically very different beast than the Russel Davies run. Massive credit to Mr. Gold who has adapted to this new stylistic direction to write some of the best music of the show’s long and storied history.

So we come to the sixth series, the most recent and thus far most ambitious soundtrack yet. Series Six is a season dominated by answering very large and very important questions that have been presented over the course of the last few years. The season was also split down the middle which gives it a really great pace and flow.

The Transformers trilogy is an interesting beast. The first film was a surprisingly great sci-fi action film, the second was one of the worst pieces of junk I have ever sat through and the third comes somewhere in the middle. Despite the inconsistency in quality from film to film the one thing that remained steady in it’s excellence was Steve Jablonsky’s scores.

Jablonsky comes from the Hans Zimmer cadre of film composers who have dominated the movie score scene over the last decade. Like Klaus Badelt and Harry Gregson-Williams before him, Jablonsky made a significant impact in his career collaborating with a prolific filmmaker, Michael Bay. He had several good scores prior to Transformers, particularly The Island, but it wasn’t until he scored the giant talking robot opus that you knew you were listening to a real talent who has limitless potential.

Now at the end of the Transformers saga Silva Screen Records has put together a collection of the music from the entire trilogy, celebrating some of the best action sci-fi music ever written. The music is performed by London Music Works and does a really incredible job of capturing the essence of what the music is. This is especially great considering that at times the music actually sounds quite different.

Silva Screen records has done a wonderful job in recent years of putting out “best of” releases of music by absolutely legendary composers. The latest addition to this library are two new releases showcasing a living legend and a modern master, James Horner and Hans Zimmer. The Horner collection is an update to Silva’s original release, adding in some of his more recent scores, Avatar and The Karate Kid, while the Zimmer collection is a second volume focusing mainly on his work in the 2000’s.

These collections are particularly intriguing to film score fans as all of the music is performed by the City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra. The tracks on these albums are new recordings that are arranged for the Orchestra, essentially creating “covers” of the classic musical pieces we have come to know and love.

Like pop or rock songs, covers can be a mixed bad. Sometimes a new perspective on a song can take it from good to amazing, while other times the magic can be lost in translation.

Thankfully, The City of Prague Philharmonic has a long history of successful re-recordings of classic music and these sets are more proof of their ability to recapture the soul of the music they play. While it isn’t all perfect, there are several tracks that they might have even improved with their new renditions.

Silva Screen Records has recently released two new best of collections featuring two of today’s top names in film music. First up is The Music of James Horner which is a 2 disc set that updates Silva Screen’s previous Horner collection Titanic – The Essential James Horner.

Tracking Horner’s career from the very beginning all the way to his most recent work with The Karate Kid, the collection features all of his very best work, represented by one or two of the best tracks for each soundtrack.

Also recently released from Silva Screen Records is the followup collection to their 2007 release, The Essential Hans Zimmer Collection, entitled Film Music of Hans Zimmer Vol. 2. This set features mostly music from the last decade, including Inception, the pervious three Pirates of the Caribbean films and Sherlock Holmes. Aside from the recent hits, the set also has some choice tracks from Zimmer’s work in the 90’s, going as far back as The Lion King.