Agreed, Michael Giacchino's
Ratatouille score is fantastic (and somewhat hard to find .. even in L.A.!) And yes, he does seem to 'channel' Gerschwin at times; much as he 'channeled' John Barry for
The Incredibles.
I've listened to it several times a day over the past week, and I'm continually amazed by its lush variations of the central theme. It really
should be a strong candidate, come Oscar season .. we'll have to wait and see.
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Happily, the
Ratatouille CD contains the complete score from the film .. unlike the abbreviated offering of
Meet the Robinsons from earlier this year, which squeezed nearly 20 minutes of Danny Elfman's score off the disc in order to accomodate the songs (some of which weren't even in the film!). Although Disney did produce a 'complete' Elfman score CD, which was given to the animation crew at the wrap party, the (very few) examples which have made their way onto eBay have sold in the
$150 to
$300 range!
It's instances such as this which provide a strong argument for separate 'score' and 'soundtrack' CD releases (as DreamWorks does for most of their films).
Actually, I've noticed that there
is a separate 'song' CD for
Ratatouille, entitled
"What's Cookin'?" .. but I haven't bought it, since it doesn't seem to have much to do with actual music from the film .. it seems to be music 'inspired by', or even just 'tangentially related to' Paris and/or food.