Original Review by Jonathan BroxtonMasters of the Air is the latest TV mini-series from executive producers Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks looking at the American military experience in World War II. It serves as a companion piece its predecessors Band of Brothers (2001) and The Pacific (2010), as well as the 2020 movie Greyhound, and is based on the 2007 book of the same name by Donald L. Miller, which follows the actions of the 100th Bomb Group, a Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber unit in the Eighth Air Force in eastern England during World War II. Led by Gale ‘Buck’ Cleven and John ‘Bucky’ Egan, the group embarks on a series of dangerous missions to bomb targets inside German-occupied Europe. The series stars Austin Butler and Callum Turner as Buck and Bucky, with support from Anthony Boyle, Nikolai Kinski, and Saltburn’s Barry Keoghan.
The score for Masters of the Air is by composer Blake Neely, who has retained the sole composing duties he had on Greyhound, after sharing the work with Hans Zimmer and Geoff Zanelli on The Pacific, and being part of the orchestrating team on Band of Brothers for Michael Kamen. Over the last decade or so Neely has been heavily involved in the various Arrowverse super-hero TV series on the CW network, which was very popular but didn’t receive much critical acclaim, so it’s nice to see him returning to ‘prestige TV’ with Masters of the Air. Thankfully, he rose to the occasion, writing a score that combines sweeping heroism and broad Americana, but which is tempered by a more somber musical reflection on loss, death, and the tragedy of war.
The centerpiece of the score is its main theme, “Soar,” and for me it’s one of the best things Neely has written in years. After a quiet opening the orchestra slowly builds to a crescendo, after which the music explodes into a superb, noble, patriotic, rousing theme, the orchestra accompanied by a subtle choir and tolling bells – a perfect musical depiction of both the exhilaration of flight, and of the heroic sacrifices the men who flew these planes made in defense of freedom. The sweep in this music is absorbing, truly excellent, and it is just as memorable as the theme for both Band of Brothers and The Pacific. The theme is deeply embedded into the rest of the score, and receives especially powerful restatements in cues like “The Bloody Hundredth” and “The Flag,” but thankfully Neely is careful to be over-reliant on it for too long, and instead explores numerous different suspense and action textures as the score develops.
Several action cues stand out. “Around the Clock” introduces one of the score’s clever conceits, the sound an actual ticking clock in the percussion section, with adds a sense of mounting pressure and relentless energy to the increasingly frantic orchestral textures, which become quicker and more intense over the course of more than six minutes; some of the brass writing here is noticeably complex, sometimes verging on the dissonant. This clock-tick idea also recurs in some of the subsequent action cues, to equally excellent effect.
Later, “I Can Fix It” surrounds statements of the main theme with a bank of florid, rhythmic strings. “Rack ‘Em Up and Knock ‘Em Down” is five minutes of extreme anxiety and tension, strained orchestral textures underpinned again by the clock-tick idea, before it all concludes with a thunderous explosion of dark throbbing brass. The aforementioned “The Bloody Hundredth” may be the pick of these action cues, and it is especially resounding when the main theme explodes into heroic high gear during the latter half of the track.
“The Enemy Below” makes excellent use of frantically-undulating strings, complication percussion patterns, and ominous brass outbursts to create a sense of anxiety and alarm, and “Punching Through” impressively incorporates a statement of the main theme in to a bed of emotional strings and powerful brass. “An Impossible Ask” and “Unwanted Transfers” are both relentlessly aggressive, churning strings and rattling percussion patterns keeping the tension levels at maximum, while fragments of the main theme attempt to peek through the intensity; the use of a soft choir during the climax of the first of these two cues is a welcome addition too. One thing I noticed about these action cues in particular is how much like 1990s James Horner they sound; the way Neely offsets the frantic string ostinatos with slower brass phrases and relentless snare drum percussion licks feels to me like vintage Horner, which may be one of the reasons I found them to be so tonally appealing.
This action is counterbalanced by extended sequences of down-time, those moments between the missions where the adrenaline has worn off and the nervousness kicks in, or when the airmen are simply trying to build camaraderie with each other, telling stories of home, and their plans for life after the war is over. I like the sense of nervous anticipation in “Post Engines, Pre-Flight” – the calm before the storm – as well as the gorgeous solo horn writing in “Kind of Beautiful”.
There is also, of course, reference to the more tragic side of the conflict. With war comes death, and in cues like “Every Second is a Little Death” Neely acknowledges this with passages for poignant strings and low, somber brass. Elsewhere, “One Day in Hell” is a searing string lament of great emotional power, and both “Long Winter March/The White Horse” and “Horrors” are, as one would expect, on the musically distressing side.
After the compellingly noble variation of the main theme in “The Flag,” the finale of the score embraces a more optimistic and celebratory tone, with “Surrender, ” “Celebrations,” and “This Is It” all offering warm brass, lush orchestral tones, lovely crescendos, and several allusions to the main theme, as well as an increased woodwind presence that changes the score’s entire vibe. The hymn-like theme that emerges towards the end of “This Is It” is especially outstanding. The conclusive “Going Home” is end title piece for the show, and it offers an excellent final statement of the main theme – jubilant and bold – before reducing almost to a whisper, a final note of somber reflection and appropriate poignancy.
Masters of the Air is a great score. I have read some criticism of the score here and there, especially about how the score suffers from a ‘generic middle section,’ how the main theme is un-memorable, and how Neely relies on too many ‘Zimmer tropes’ from scores like Dunkirk in the way the music is constructed, but I disagree with all of this. As I mentioned, more than anything else, Neely’s score reminds me of 1990s James Horner, and I found the action-heavy middle section of the score to be intensely compelling and enjoyable. Yes, it’s true that the ‘clock tick’ conceit was also used by Zimmer in parts of Dunkirk, but he doesn’t hold the copyright on that idea, and its use here adds to the overall sense of anticipatory drama. When you add to this the excellent main theme, my personal opinion is that Masters of the Air is a solid, engaging war score which successfully conveys the excitement and drama of WWII air combat, while offering a respectful acknowledgement of the bravery shown by the men in the cockpit.
Buy the Masters of the Air soundtrack from the Movie Music UK Store
Track Listing:
- Soar – Main Title Theme from Masters of the Air (2:36)
- Post Engines, Pre-Flight (3:53)
- Around the Clock (6:13)
- Every Second is a Little Death (4:42)
- I Can Fix It (2:19)
- Rack ‘Em Up and Knock ‘Em Down (4:28)
- Kind of Beautiful (2:10)
- The Bloody Hundredth (3:23)
- One Day in Hell (4:19)
- The Enemy Below (6:45)
- Punching Through (3:52)
- Stories Over Poker (5:07)
- Borrowed Time (1:51)
- An Impossible Ask (6:31)
- Unchosen Transfers (5:07)
- Long Winter March/The White Horse (4:10)
- Horrors (3:57)
- The Flag/All This Killing (3:25)
- Surrender (3:58)
- Celebrations (3:14)
- This Is It (3:43)
- Going Home – End Title Theme from Masters of the Air (5:06)
Running Time: 90 minutes 49 seconds
Platoon Music (2024)
Music composed and conducted by Blake Neely. Orchestrations by Blake Neely and Paul Englishby. Recorded and mixed by Thor Fienberg. Edited by Joseph S. DeBeasi and Angela Claverie. Album produced by Blake Neely and Jacob Neely.