Sometimes a fella just gets lucky. Plain and simple. Jeremiah Johnson has been a favorite film of mine for nearly as long as I can remember liking films. It came out in 1972 when I was 11 years old going on 12. At the time it was like no other movie I had seen or heard of. There was very little dialogue, and what little there was sounded stiff and oddly formal, it was a formalized style of speaking that was new to my young ears, and yet with those very few words to underscore the adventures and experiences told of in the tale, the movie captured my heart and it fired my imagination. In many ways it helped to shape my life for years to come. It was a call to the road, a call to Adventure, a call to a place where a fella, if he could learn to watch his top knot and keep his eye on the skyline, might be able to start over if he needed to, make a go of it in a new life. It was powerful stuff.

Well, for years now I've wanted to find the soundtrack to this iconic American film, but the story goes that the movie score was never released for public consumption. At the premier of the film over 30 years ago, some 1000 copies of an LP made up of soundtrack selections were given away as favours at the gathering, but actually finding one of these LP's these days that one, you could afford, and two was still listenable, well, that was the seemingly insurmountable challenge. But in this age of the internet and digital wonder, sometimes, like I said at the start of this ramble, sometimes, a fella gets lucky.

Last night in one of my occasional fits of aimless googling in search of generally unattainable things, I ran across a posting on a bulletin board by a fella who had digitized a copy of one of the mythic Jeremiah Johnson LP's, and in the spirit of the mountain life he was offering to share his find with any who were in need of it. That bulletin board posting was over a year old when I stumbled across it last night, but James promptly responded to my emailed inquiry, and today I have on my iPod the soundtrack to Jeremiah Johnson. James, thank you. Thank you very much.

Like I said, sometimes a fella gets lucky.

And so here for any of you pilgrims out there who might be keeping your eyes on the skyline as well are a few Jeremiah Johnson selections. The complete soundtrack can be downloaded here, free to all who seek it. Enjoy. I'm watching my top knot. You watch your'n. JB

Overture
Hatchet Jack and Bear Claw
Top Knot
The Wedding
Swan
The Cabin
An Indian Says
Ride To The Buffalo
Maybe April
A Mighty Enemy
The Way That You Wander
The Ballad Of Jeremiah




UPDATE - Jan 15, 2012
I was informed by Martin Halbach of Germany that there is now in fact an official CD release of this geat soundtrack! Evidently it came out in 2009 after I found the online version and had stopped searching, so I totally missed its arrival. You can find it here and also on Amazon. They have done a first rate job with this release offering a set of music only tracks along with the original music with dialogue tracks from the LP edition, and also some alternate takes on a few of the tracks. The CD doesn't appear to be widely available, and it looks like they limited the release to 10,000 copies, so on the chance they allow it to go out of print yet again, I will for the time being leave the original LP version here on Little Delving, but I highly recommend you get yourself a copy of this CD while you can! It's something every fan of the movie will want. Thanks, Martin!