Howard Shore – The Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The King (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

Climax to the quests that had been unfolding in the previous two movies, "The Return Of The King" was the end of a larger-than-life story, and of the Third Age itself with plenty of epic moments where fates were met and sacrifices made.

Howard Shore’s score took all the themes that had populated the previous instalments, and kept them evolving into both glorious and intimate endings.

If it seemed impossible to exceed the blissful beauty that Shore created in "TTT" (especially in "One Of The Dunedain" and "Arwen’s Fate"), he still manages to move us in "The Grace Of Undomiel", when Arwen takes the decision of not leaving Aragorn behind, or "The Houses Of Healing" sang by Liv Tyler herself during the scene in which Aragorn heals Eowyn.
Other outstanding moments include the epic of "The Lightning Of The Beacons", the wisely weaved contrast between the simple yet beautiful song that Pippin sings to Denethor and the eerie background while Faramir and his knights approach their demise ("The Sacrifice Of Faramir"), the essence of evil, pure horror and stalking presence drenching all the cues for Shelob, in contrast of the peace in "A Far Green Country", when Gandalf tells Pippin about the shores of Valinor to put some courage in him.
And then, the grand finale.

From the moment when everything seems lost and Sam tries to infuse Frodo with some strength by ing The Shire, with a delicate flute and strings melody, building up to a glorious climax when he, also exhausted, takes Frodo up the slopes of Mountain Doom, to the moment when the last immortals leave the Grey Havens, the Fellowship is finally dissolved and Sam returns to his family in Hobbiton, we have a true ride of epic climaxes ("Mount Doom", "The Crack Of Doom") and utterly peaceful and beautiful moments ("The Eagles", "The Journey To The Grey Havens"...).
Worth mentioning "Into The West", performed by Annie Lennox, who creates here one the best film closing songs ever, and my favourite closing song from a perfect soundtrack trilogy.

Whoever decided to buy the latest listing of this album at $45, let me know how your transaction goes. The seller, Gringo81, is new to Discogs, and has no reviews. That, combined with the ridiculously low sale prices, makes me skeptical.

I'm so sad I didn't get into vinyl earlier. I would have gotten this in my collection.

I hope this is okay to post this. For prospective buyers, beware of these low cost ones popping up. Very likely not legit and a scam. Not sure why so many popping up lately on this listing.

Sounds fantastic. Pretty good frequency response across the range. Love the miniature poster art on the album sleeve, but the hologram should have been placed on the plastic case, not the inlay. Many albums from this period sound terrible on cassette as many were licensed out to small labels that did not always make very good editions. This album does not suffer that fate. It sounds as good as a cassette can.

I got this boxset a few weeks ago at a reasonable price. The album is amazing, 6 vinyls, book, box packaging, etc... It sounds very powerful, clear and pristine IMHO, no pops or surface noise in my copy. I can understand this edition was expensive in its release date (boxset, extras...), but the current prices are so so inflated. I think these prices are a crime.

I recently aquired this one, and realised the LP#2 is missing from my box set, that includes 6 LP in total... I instead have two LP#1 and then it goes to LP#3.
I do have 6 vinyls as sold on the listing, but instead of having LP1 2 3 4 5 6, i have LP 1 1 3 4 5 6
For those looking into buying this box in the future, if you can you should ask if the 6 vinyls in your box are indeed differents.
I can provide photos for those doubting, just in case :)
Otherwise, i like this box set very much, eventhough the map is indeed not very good looking.

I have loved JRR TOLKIEN's writings since I was a little kid, and always wanted the Howard Shore box sets on vinyl... but everything I'm reading says the packaging and audio quality is pretty poor... so I'm hoping someday a quality remaster / reissue comes out for all of Tolkien's works on vinyl.

I hear the audio on Return of the King is the best of the 3, but splitting up the map between all the releases was dumb as the maps are not consistent in style and do not even match up lol... which is unacceptable.

Fellowship is being sold for $500
Two Towers is $75
King is $100
The Hobbit isn't avinylable in this format

So here's to waiting for a quality box set of the whole series in a consistent and quality release worthy of the work it's representing.

The map in my set does not match up with the first two sections. The colour is wrong and the image itself is not from the same map detail. Coupled with out of line spines (Fellowship is lower than the next two) it has turned out to be a poor release for such an expensive set.

The mastering on this is brilliant, hearing "The Lighting Of The Beacons" on vinyl has now made my life complete.