Little Women: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack is the score album composed by Alexandre Desplat for the 2019 American film Little Women. A seventh film adaptation of the 1868 novel of the same name by Louisa May Alcott, the film is directed by Greta Gerwig, and stars an ensemble cast consisting of Saoirse Ronan, Emma Watson, Florence Pugh, Eliza Scanlen, Laura Dern, Timothée Chalamet, Meryl Streep, Tracy Letts, Bob Odenkirk, James Norton, Louis Garrel, and Chris Cooper. The original score album was released by Sony Music on December 13, 2019.
Desplat had restrained orchestration for the film with two pianos and limited musicians, except for one of the cues, which demanded a wide range of instruments. He called the score as a combination of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and David Bowie's works, as a wide range of emotions being pictured in the film and its characters. The score received positive critical response, praising the composition and thematic setting to the film's characters. It received several awards and nominations at various ceremonies.
Background
French composer Alexandre Desplat composed the score. Gerwig had admired Desplat's score for the film Birth (2004) and aspired to work with him; she enlisted him for the "beautiful but not saccharine" and "exacting" qualities of his music for the film.
For one of the cues, Desplat employed a 40-piece orchestra that included a piano, string, harp, flute, clarinet, vibraphone and celesta. The first theme, he wrote for the film was for the scene where "Josephine March (Saoirse Ronan) exhilaratingly walking through New York City", which set the tone for the film in its entirety. He thought of using a string quartlet for the song, but later decided to use a string orchestra, to convey the emotions in whole. He further said in an interview that Gerwig specified that she would like the music to be "a mix of Mozart meeting Bowie".
Desplat worked on several cues for the film which Gerwig had liked. He further recalled, "When I saw the movie, the music felt almost wall to wall. It was like watching a ballet with beautiful people in beautiful places, discovering life, keeping their innocence and at the same time losing it." For a death of Elizabeth March, Desplat used a harp to produce the theme as it was "very resonant". In a scene, where March family’s matriarch, Marmee (Laura Dern), moves to Washington, D.C., Desplat produced an upbeat score that grows more somber, reflecting the mood of the film. He stated "The emotions are all piled up. It’s sadness, joy, desire of love, hope. It’s always in layers and the music had to capture that."
The first theme from the score, which is the title of the film, was released on November 19, 2019. Two more themes "Plumfield" and "It's Romance" was later released on November 22 and December 2. A preview of the film's track list was released on December 6, and the score album was released on December 13 in digital and physical formats. A 2-disc vinyl edition of the score was released on February 28, 2020.
Track listing
Track listing adapted from Tidal.
Critical reception
The score received critical acclaim. Critic Jim Paterson of Mfiles said "Desplat's score is wholesome and speaks from the heart with an innocent simplicity. Although the tone is fairly consistent throughout, achieved mostly by his orchestral palette, Desplat rarely repeats himself and instead provides a constant source of invention within that tonal range." Jonathan Broxton further claimed "Desplat's music is everything one would expect it to be; it overflows with gorgeous orchestrations, sublime instrumental combinations and harmonies, a dramatic sense of freedom and movement, effortless elegance, and lush emotional content. It works like gangbusters in the film, allowing what could otherwise have been a somewhat staid and stuffy adaptation of a 150-year-old novel to take flight as a passionate, exciting story of romance and female empowerment. The thematic content is perhaps a little on the subtle side, and may not immediately become apparent to those who need more overt and memorable melodic writing in order to connect with a score, but, this is a minor quibble which in no way detracts from the overall excellence of the piece."