My Neighbor Totoro

Joe Hisaishi's soundtrack for the 1988 film My Neighbor Totoro is as wonderful and exciting as the film itself. Hisaishi, who composed scores for Miyazaki's earlier films Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind and Laputa: Castle in the Sky, clearly improved with Totoro. While Castle in the Sky's score was good (and the expanded edition was fabulous), Nausicaä lacked the magic of his later works. And both these scores relyed too heavily on synthesizers. My Neighbor Totoro also employs synthesizers, but the style works much better for this film, giving it a bouncy, fun sound. Azumi Inoue, who performed "Carrying You" for the Castle in the Sky soundtrack, sings four songs on this album and vocalizes for one track. Her energetic, clear voice works perfectly for the film. Although the songs on this album are in Japanese, not in English, as some reviewers have already pointed out, they sound just as good if not better than the songs recorded for the Disney dub. (Personally, I think they are better.)Azumi opens the album with the fun, march-like song "Stroll." This is followed by "The Village In May", an easy-going piece that plays during Satsuke and Mei's trip to their new house. As the exclamation mark in the title promises, "A Haunted House!" picks up the pace. The sythesizers and bouncy beats on this track are just plain fun, as are the soot sprite sound effects in "Mei and the Traveling Soot." "Evening Wind" is a much gentler, reflective piece, featuring a flute solo, lower woodwinds, and a harp in the background. "Not Scared" begins loudly and dramatically before leveling off into the soot sprite sound effects and the main Totoro theme. "Let's Go To the Hospital" and "Mother" are both lovely tracks, while "Totoro" is low and mysterious.Joe Hisaishi does a great job of balancing out the upbeat, fun tracks with slow, wistful pieces and even tones of mystery and wonder, like those in "Totoro." Azumi Inoue's vocals on "Mother" and "A Lost Child" are beautiful and add a nice touch as well. Although My Neighbor Totoro has several reoccurring themes, the strongest theme is featured on the outstanding track, "The Path of Wind." This is possibly the best track on the album. This theme also appears in quite a few other tracks, like "Evening Wind", "The Huge Tree in the Tsukamori Forest", and "Moonlight Flight." Hisaishi adds variation to each of these tracks, so the melody never gets monotonous or tiring. "Mei Is Missing" is one of the most heartrending pieces on the album, but it is followed by the upbeat "Catbus" and the joyful track "I'm So Glad." Azumi Inoue closes out the album with "My Neighbor Totoro (The Ending Song)" and another rendition of "Stroll", in which she is joined by the Suginami Children's Choir.Because each track is about only about one and a half to two minutes long, My Neighbor Totoro is a relatively quick listen. I would recommend playing to it from start to finish for best possible enjoyment, instead of skipping around from track to track. Joe Hisaishi combined all the wonder and joy of childhood into his score for My Neighbor Totoro. This is one of my favorite Hisaishi albums, and I can listen to it for hours without getting tired of it. My mom played this CD during some of her art lessons this past winter, and all the kids in her classes loved it, especially the class of five-year-olds. (They said it made them feel like dancing.) In summary, the My Neighbor Totoro original soundtrack is fabulous and a great purchase for anyone who enjoys Hisaishi's music or is a fan of Miyazaki's films.

I was fortunate to find the soundtrack to one of my all time favorite anime films on Amazon. It's amazing to own a CD from another country. But onto the CD itself.Like most of Studio Ghibli's output, the musical score helps the film make it awe-inspiring and My Neighbor Totoro is no exception. My Neighbor Totoro was the first anime that I saw, and it got me interested in anime. When I listened to the tracks, I was surprised to hear parts of the score that weren't even in the film. Which I thought was too bad, because they were brilliant. It's likely that they were originally part of some scenes that never made it into the final version of the film. There's also a song included that's not heard in the film itself (but the score of it is heard during the scene when the village is looking for Mei). Also included are longer versions of the opening and ending songs.This is one of the best soundtracks I have ever listened to. I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys My Neighbor Totoro.

After much confusion with the post office i recieved this cd. Thank you, It's great!

Some of the best movie music out there comes from the pen of Joe Hisaishi. To me, Totoro is second only to Howl's Moving Castle as a score. Why 4 stars? As is typicacl with Hisaishhi's movie albums, the material is repetitive and lacks enough leight motifs to satisfy a pallate that wants variety. But sometimes, a steak can taste good by its self. This is some of the most excellent steak there is, I just wish there was a side to it.

Totoro is, IMHO, the best movies for kids. There is no evil in the movie. A simple statement, yet surprisingly rare since many movies for kids operate with simple good-vs-evil plots.This is the original soundtrack (not some orchestral version). It includes the few songs which are not instrumental and - of course - since this is the original soundtrack these songs are in japanese (because in the original movie - at least in the one released in Europe - the title and end title song are in Japanese).

The shipping was fast! Such cute and light music compared to most of the studio ghibli music.

The case was broken when it arrived....

This is the OST but for some reason it has SO much more vibrancy to it than the movie version! The first movie my husband and I ever saw together was My Neighbor Totoro and we had both grown up on the movie. I've owned the Fox movie version for many years on VHS and DVD... Finally being able to get the soundtrack had made the set complete!