I've not seen the movie, but I can only imagine how vivid a picture this music must have been able to draw when it was joined to whatever images were being shown on the screen. Just listening to what was being played evoked strong visuals and gave you a deeper understanding of what the events being depicted might have meant to those involved at the time. The two pieces of music that I personally found most moving were Nakai's "Trail Of Tears" and Titos Sompas' "Work Song". Perhaps not being an American I identify more with the people who were run roughshod by them, but in any event they were the songs that I found most distinctive.
For "Trail Of Tears" R. Carlos Nakai sat in the studio surrounded by images of Cherokee people when they were forced to march from the hills of Tennessee over to Oklahoma and improvised the entire song. Nobody knows how many thousands of men, women, and children died on that march, and Nakai's flute is the perfect instrument to capture that sorrow. To be honest, I've never been a big fan of his playing before. I've always found it a little too insipid as compared to other flute players, but here he really taps into his emotions and delivers something brilliant.
I'm not sure how Titos Sompas was able to capture so much with so little in his "Work Song", but if you can listen to that song without gaining any understanding of how horrible it must have been to be a slave, than your heart is made of stone. I don't know any of Sompas' previous work, but after hearing his contribution to this soundtrack I'd be very interested in hearing some more.
Of course it's Christopher Hedge who is responsible for pulling all the disparate elements together into a cohesive picture and he does a remarkable job. There aren't too many people who are capable of telling a story with just music, but he has accomplished it with the soundtrack that he composed for Andrew Jackson: The Atrocious Saint. What's even more remarkable was the fact that this is completely instrumental, yet still is able to speak clearer than many a history book talking about the same subject. Movie soundtracks don't normally stand the test of time as unique pieces of music, but I think Christopher Hedge's composition will be an exception to that rule.
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