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Quartet Records, in collaboration with GDM and Universal Music Publishing Italy, celebrates the centenary of Maestro Riz Ortolani with the ultimate edition of his classic, killer score for DAY OF ANGER (I giorni dell'ira, 1967), an iconic spaghetti western directed by Tonino Valerii and starring Lee Van Cleef and Giuliano Gemma. The film, one of the most beloved by fans of the genre, is about a scruffy street sweeper who becomes the pupil of a famed gunfighter, and the stage for confrontation is set when the gunman overruns the boy's town through violence and corruption.
Riz Ortolani' score finds him at the height of his creative powers, blending sweeping orchestral themes, tense action motifs and moments of surprising lyrical beauty into a uniquely sophisticated musical experience.
While Ennio Morricone's influence often dominates discussions of music for Italian westerns, Ortolani's approach to DAY OF ANGER reveals a distinct voice—elegant, dramatic and melodic. The unforgettable main theme (rediscovered by Tarantino and included in his film Django Unchained) captures the film's atmosphere of revenge, ambition and moral conflict, while recurring motifs demonstrate the composer's remarkable ability to balance raw tension with emotional depth.
Albums were released by RCA in 1967 in mono (the Italian LP) and stereo (the U.S. edition). Both featured the same track listing, though with different mixes, takes and edits on some tracks. That LP program was subsequently released on CD, but always in the Italian mono version until the two most recent reissues, which also included the film score in stereo. For this new 2-CD edition, we have included the complete score in stereo, in addition to the mono and stereo albums, from their respective original elements. The audio for this release (supervised by Claudio Fuiano) has been restored and mastered by Chris Malone; the package includes an essay by Jeff Bond.
This soundtrack remains an essential chapter in the history of the Italian western and a shining example of Riz Ortolani's extraordinary legacy as one of Europe's greatest film composers.
- Quartet Records
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