Nordic Noir. Wallander. Steig Larsson’s Millenium Trilogy (The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played With Fire, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest). The Killing (Forbrydelsen) from Denmark, which was a sensational hit, spawning a not nearly as effective American version. The Bridge (Bron) a Danish/Swedish production, again spawning a not nearly as effective American version. And then there was the wonderful Danish miniseries, The Spider (Edderkopen) from 2000.

The series was set in post World War II Copenhagen, with the country still recovering from the end of Nazi occupation, with gangsters, corruption, and the black market everywhere. It’s a large, tangled spider’s web of intrigue, deceit, honor, love, corruption and family, played out against an atmosphere thick with wonderful period detail in the settings and costumes. And what really ties the six brilliant episodes together is the wonderful and evocative score by Soren Hyldgaard.

Beginning with the mesmerizing main title music, which draws you immediately into a musical spider’s web, the score is so multilayered, varied and rich in its thematic material, it almost plays like a noir tone poem. Hyldgaard is that rare thing in film music today, a composer who is not afraid of melody, and his melodies in The Spider are sublime and unforgettable. His music is part of the fabric of the series and propels us from episode to episode, tying together all the various plots and subplots. The music is beautifully played by the City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra.

We are thrilled to bring his stunning score to The Spider to CD. There was an earlier CD release in Denmark, which quickly went out of print – that CD was about forty-four minutes duration. This CD runs close to seventy-nine minutes and is complete save for some repeated themes and cues. It’s a major score with occasional echoes of Herrmann, Goldsmith and John Barry, but somehow remaining its own unique musical landscape. This CD was mastered from the composer’s complete score tapes. -KRITZERLAND

1 Main Title 1:32
2 Prologue 1:25
3 Copenhagen 1949 3:27
4 Escape From The Warehouse 1:04
5 The Newspaper Office 1:41
6 The Brother Returns 2:06
7 Print The Story! 1:47
8 Oxford House 3:12
9 Flashback - In The Lion's Den 1:40
10 Lisbeth 1:24
11 Reporters At Work 1:28
12 Love Theme From The Spider 2:31
13 Discovered By The Mob 1:13
14 Spider Theme Variation 2:01
15 Destiny 1:46
16 Searching For "The Spider" 1:39
17 Spider Noir 2:21
18 Vanbjerg 1:22
19 Who's Pulling The Strings? 2:36
20 Elegy 2:17
21 Love Theme For Strings 1:15
22 Finding Facts 2:05
23 Stakeout And Pursuit 2:01
24 A Prime Suspect 2:48
25 Romantic Interlude 0:46
26 Captured By Bad Guys 1:17
27 Melancholia 1:47
28 Drowning (Deleted Scene) 1:21
29 Walking Through The Night 1:45
30 Headlines 0:51
31 Closing In 1:36
32 Tragic Deaths 2:19
33 Bjarne And Lisbeth 1:47
34 Ole's Nightmare 2:21
35 No Way Out 1:54
36 Nightmares 1:29
37 Love Theme For Sax 1:44
38 Spider Noir Version 2 2:15
39 Shadowing Bootleggers 1:20
40 Love Theme For Oboe 2:39
41 Ole's Fate 1:12
42 Deadline 1:08
43 End Title 1:30