Harrogath，Fortress新

"Fortress" - Liner Notes - March 27, 2001

"This track invites the player into the snowy, violent world of our expansion pack. The barbarians and their endless war against the forces of evil required something that explored the lyrical side of the orchestra without becoming too feminine or frilly. Though people here at the office teased me with tortured renditions of Luke Skywalker monologues while mixing this one down, the direct influences on this were a bit more highfalutin'. A variety of operatic scores provided inspiration for the textures and pacing which I hoped to achieve in the all-important "town" theme. The use of pentatonic themes in Debussy's Peleas and Melisande deserves a special mention as a nice model for what I wanted to do harmonically. The pentatonic scale (the black keys on a piano) was the ideal sound for the barbarians, as it suggests all of the qualities we associate with the classic image of a warrior--primitive but grounded and not prone to extreme emotional extremes. This simple melodic framework provides a nice contrast to the chromatic writing found in the unpredictable world that awaits our heroes later on in the quest to destroy Baal and his nasty minions. Conductor Kirk Trevor and the Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra hit this one out of the park, with the violins and horns making good use of the spotlight."