Enterprise (Soundtrack from the TV Show)

Album Review

When the producers of the fifth Star Trek series decided to use a vocal track over the show's opening credits, controversy immediately erupted among fans. After all, Star Trek had a rich legacy of memorable instrumental themes, from the bold fanfare that opened the original series to Jerry Goldsmith's triumphant march used in Star Trek: The Next Generation (a theme originally written for Star Trek: The Motion Picture) to Dennis McCarthy's plaintive opening for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and, finally, Goldsmith's rich, intrepid theme for Star Trek: Voyager. For Enterprise, the producers broke with tradition by choosing "Faith of the Heart," penned by hitmaker Diane Warren and sung by Russell Watson, to accompany the show's opening collage depicting the history of spaceflight. It's an interesting if somewhat bewildering choice and one that continued to divide fans. Thankfully, the song plays much better on album than on television, seeming somehow easier to take while continuing to sound a bit out of place within the context of Dennis McCarthy's underscore. Two versions of the song are included on this CD, a full-length rendition which opens the album and, at the other end, the shortened version used on the show. The bulk of the album is dedicated to McCarthy's score to the pilot episode, "Broken Bow," built primarily around the pleasant, Americana-style "Archer's Theme" (originally intended for use under the main titles). The music unfolds in a style typical for later Star Trek projects, avoiding the strongly melodic (and sometimes melodramatic) strains present in the original series and presenting more of an orchestral tapestry. McCarthy creates a strong sense of mood, using some effective percussion passages to represent the villains while keeping his main focus on building textures to underplay the action on screen. While this technique is usually more effective onscreen than on disc, here it works fairly well on its own. There's nothing spectacular here, but Enterprise does make a representative and worthy addition to the Star Trek musical canon.