SOUND OF FREEDOM ORIGINAL MOTION PICTURE SOUNDTRACK WITH MUSIC BY JAVIER NAVARRETE
AVAILABLE EVERYWHERE NOW FROM SONY MUSIC MASTERWORKS
New York, NY—March 22, 2024
NEW YORK, NY (March 22, 2024) – Sony Music Masterworks today releases SOUND OF FREEDOM (ORIGINAL MOTION PICTURE SOUNDTRACK) by JAVIER NAVARRETE. Available everywhere now, the album features original music written by Navarrete for the high-stakes true story about a federal agent in a fight against child traffickers in Colombia. Navarrete resonated with the film’s storyline and themes, particularly the importance of protecting childhood innocence in an increasingly grown up world. Recording at London’s iconic Abbey Road Studios, Navarrete utilized a largescale orchestra comprised of internationally renowned instrumentalists for the soundtrack, also enlisting youth soloists and a children’s choir as collaborators across the album’s 19 tracks. Directed by Alejandro Monteverde, and distributed by Angel Studios, Sound of Freedom is available now to stream and purchase – watch the trailer.
Of the score, composer JAVIER NAVARRETE says, “From the beginning, Sound of Freedom was a unique project. The roughness of the subject material made me doubt if I would be up to the task, and I went back and forth about it, but now believe I made the right decision. It took some time for Alejandro [Monteverde] and me to find the right key for the subject matter, until I came up with a mockup including a children’s choir. Our conductor, Julian Kershaw, would later describe their singing as ‘primitive-pagan,’ but it is the call of the lost children, their way to plead with us to rescue them from the depths of their misery and absolute darkness. This single melody and the fragility of the children’s voices immediately unblocked our indecision and doubts: melodies, guitars and strings easily followed once we had opened the doors to this magical yet unfortunate kingdom.”
Speaking about the album’s recording process, he continued: “I suggested that the score would be better recorded on a large scale, and the producers agreed. I have to thank them for this: they hired the best choir, orchestra and instrumental soloists on hand, including guitarist Ale Martí, and brought them together to record at London’s Abbey Road Studios. The entire process of recording and mixing went smoothly, with some highly emotional moments for the performers, engineers and attendants. Now, the result is up for everyone to judge and hopefully enjoy.”
On a more personal level, Navarrete mentions the impact the project has had on his life, concluding of his experience: “The moment I arrived to London for the score’s recording, I completely lost any desire to drink alcohol. I never had any intention to stop drinking, it really just happened. It’s been four years and I haven’t had any desire to go back. I feel much better. That may seem a modest amount of Freedom to have conquered with these sounds, but it means a lot to me.”
ABOUT SOUND OF FREEDOM
Sound of Freedom, based on the incredible true story, shines a light on even the darkest of places. After rescuing a young boy from ruthless child traffickers, a federal agent learns the boy’s sister is still captive and decides to embark on a dangerous mission to save her. With time running out, he quits his job and journeys deep into the Colombian jungle, putting his life on the line to free her from a fate worse than death.
CONNECT WITH SOUND OF FREEDOM
SOUND OF FREEDOM (ORIGINAL MOTION PICTURE SOUNDTRACK)
TRACKLISTING –
Rocio
Sound of Freedom
Room 204
Just Give Me a Week
The Promise
Help, Help!
Don’t Tattoo a Child
Streets
The Border
Tu Papa ya Sabe
The Sons of God Are Not For Sale
The Call
Watch the Beach
Fifty-Four Kids
If Things Go Wrong Tomorrow
Fields of Drug
Slaves in the Jungle
Reunion
Freedom
ABOUT JAVIER NAVARRETE
Javier Navarrete developed a love of music at an early age. He still recalls the sounds of a cathedral bell that inspired him daily while growing up in Teruel, a small city at inner Spain. Church music -Gregorian chant- was one of his first influences, along with sixties Brit rock and melodic ballads from Italian and Latin songwriters.
In the early seventies, Navarrete moved to Barcelona where he studied under Chilean classical contemporary composer Gabriel Brncic. Soon, he began to take part in concerts of electronic and experimental music in the context of the avant-garde dynamic scene of the late seventies and early eighties.
At some point, he felt that concert music was taking him to a path that he resented as too elitist and void of connection with audiences, and he started making music for theatre plays and dance choreographies, first, and soon after for short films, documentaries and eventually feature films.
Javier Navarrete wrote his first major score for Tras el cristal (English title: In a Glass Cage) in 1987 for director Agustí Villaronga, which remains a cult movie despite being very challenging for audiences. Not having the budget to use a large orchestra, as he would have liked it, he worked with electronics and loops, toy instruments and self-created sound sources.
Throughout the next decade he scored many independent Spanish movies, including Atolladero (1995), which casted rock star Iggy Pop as a villain, and prompted a collaboration with him as the singer of the film’s main theme, written by Navarrete.
A major break came in 2000 when director Guillermo del Toro asked him to score Devil’s Backbone, and later Pan’s Labyrinth (2006), which gave Navarrete an Oscar nomination, and also a Grammy nomination for the score album.
His career turned international then, with movies like Inkheart, Mirrors, Cracks, The Hole, The Warrior’s Way, Wrath of the Titans, Bizantium, Greta, Antlers, Emperor, Mr Harrigan’s Phone, etc.
Navarrete received an Emmy award in 2013 for the HBO made-for-television movie Hemingway and Gellhorn, directed by Philip Kaufman.
Other than American movies, he has also scored an Asian epic (Zhong Kui: Snow Girl and the Dark Crystal) and two French comedies directed by Pierre Godeau, as well as the successful TV series Paris Police.
Outside of film he has continued working in different genres of music, playing his music in concert through Europe as a guest with band Dead Can Dance, and writing and producing the opera Los Amantes (2017), back in his hometown, using local talent and with a story based on a legend that goes back to the Middle Ages.
Navarrete's music has been described as dark, disturbing and full of dry beauty. He values simplicity in his scores. Melody is one of its features, showing the influence of late romantic composers like Tchaikovsky as well as Latin folk music.
His aim is to create music for the sake of music, and collaborating in projects that, beyond their commercial exploit, explore human values and their connection with nature and with the supernatural world, both as phantasy and as faith.
JAVIER NAVARRETE APPROVED IMAGES: DOWNLOAD
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About Angel Studios: Angel Studios is the home of stories that amplify light. Through the Angel Guild, 260,000 members choose which film and television projects the studio will market and distribute. The studio enables creators and audiences to form passionate communities around creative projects, making the story behind the story as important as the final project. 104,000 Angel Guild members in 155 countries have invested nearly $80M in projects distributed by the studio to date. Angel Studios is behind the global box office hit, SOUND OF FREEDOM, which has earned $250 million in theatrical box office. Learn more at Angel.com