Speaking of soundtrack-releases, Germany is in fact a VERY interesting country! Not many soundtracks LPs (but also about a dozen of highly collectible EPs) were released in Germany in the years relevant to this site (= beginning of the LP format until mid-70ies), but whereas for example only some US-ones are collectible and most Italian ones, ALL German ones are very, very rare and of highest collectors value!

The best-known German soundtrack LPs are certainly the ones from the German Winnetou Euro-western-series, scored by Germanys answer to Herny Mancini, Martin BÖTTCHER! Five original LPs have been released, each of the first three coupling two Winnetou-western scores on one LP! The later two contain one score each and are - for reasons unknown to me - even harder to find than the first three! Pressing quality is first rate, all items from LP # 2 on are in Stereo (which is highly noticeable, since these LPs were pressed in the mid-60ies!), the nice cover artwork follows the distinctive pattern of a series and the only drawback is that they were manufactured from softer cardboard than was usual those days, but luckily they were laminated! The music is absolutely top-notch western entertainment, very much scored like US-productions of the same time, but with even more melody. If you like Elmer Bernsteins western scores from the 60ies, you will love these, too! Since the music was and still is very popular (these movies have some cult-reputation; there are Karly May-exhibts and -meetings held every once in a while!), there are also a couple of compilations existing, and the music was re-pressed several times: when vinyl was still king for everybody (and not only for the few remaining conaisseurs!), the first LP was repressed, this time in stereo, but with a less appealing cover artwork, and a 2LP-set was manufactured combining the music from four Winnetou-movies. When the CD-format was trashed on us by a music-industry trying to reduce their production-costs and at the same time trying and for a not-so-long time succeeding in rising their profits (which has backlashd - smile!), the Winnetou-scores were among the first ones, which received at CD-re-release in the beginning 90ies: Five nowadays out-of-print CDs with nice booklets and a few additional tracks were released and last year the "real thing" (if you like BIG CD-boxes) followed: a multiple CD-box with even more additional tracks and also the Telefunken Karl May-scores added plus a heavy, LP-size, 100+ pages-book with an incredible assembly of stills and poster-artwork was issued by the always reliable Bear Family-label! Not cheap, but definitly worth the price and a sure collectible in a few years (most have cost a fortune to assemble all these memorabila, and producing this box was definitly not a cheap thing, either)!!

But the above mentioned five LPs containing Martin BÖTTCHERs Winnetou-scores are not the only musical remains from Karl May-movies: when the 60ies neared its end and the popularity of Karl May-movies was in a decline already, four more movies based on Karl May novellas were shot (the two scored by Erwin Halletz were shot even simultanously!), three of them receiving a coupled LP-issue on two individual pressings released by the German Telefunken-label, one combined with Peter Thomas great score for "The last mohican", based on the same-name novel by James Fenimore Cooper. Manufactured in an incredible small print-run, receiving hardly any distribution at all, these two LPs vanished form Germanys surface faster than they could be bought by daring youngsters, who adored these kind of adventure movies. Top pressing quality combined with very appealing artwork, printed on extremely soft and not-laminated "cardboard" (paper is more like it ...), the covers were definitly not made for longlivety! Since the few who were lucky to get their copy, also liked the music a lot (should you have a chance to catch one of these movies or CD-releases some day, you will know why ...), many copies are "well-played", too ... Definitly something to be on the lookout for ... years ..., but thanks to todays CD-format all the music (and more) from these four movies is already available on CD. However, since (most) collectors are never happy with what they have, it should be noted that the score from the "Durch´s wilde Kurdistan"-Karl May follow-up-effort "Der Schatz des silbernen Löwen" is not yet available ... (this is the fourth movie I was referring to above). And a PS: Peter Tomas Karl May-score for "Thunder at the borderline" (aka "Winnetou und sein Freund Old Firehand" in Germany) was only released on CD in the early 90ies and is already a rather tough one to locate.

Aside from these Euro-western efforts (in fact most of the above were co-productions involving Italian talent!), crime movies were very popular in Germany in the 60ies: I just say "Edgar Wallace" ...! Although it would be highly interesting and is in fact a mystery, why scores from Edgar Wallace-movies were NEVER originally issued on LP (the only LP-pressing I know of is an 80ies Celine-label compilation-LP ...), quite a couple of other crime-movies did receive an accompaning soundtrack LP-release, ALL of them being TOP-crime-jazz scores and very tough to find. The musically most interesting two LPs do come from Germanys equal to Piero Umiliani, Peter THOMAS, who scored all the movies from the so-called "Jerry Cotton-series", starring Georg Nader (who died not that long ago) as FBI-Agent Jerry Cotton (Germanys answer to James Bond, by the way). Two LPs containing music from five entries of this series were released, the first one (not yet shown on this site) being "SCHÜSSE AUS DEM GEIGENKASTEN", featuring Peter Thomas´ higly original jazz-music from the first entry of this series, combined with movie-dialogue in between the musical tracks (like the Japanese and English "Get carter"-releases!). Since this LP seems not to have been very popular those days (well, technical equipment to cut out the dialogue was not that common then ...), the follow-up LP from a few years later was a compilation LP containing music from the first five entries of the series including some tracks from "Schüsse aus dem Geigenkasten". It was named "FBI-Man Jerry Cotton" and its cover is shown on this site! Both LPs were issued by the German Polydor-label and share the same production values as the above discussed five Winnetou-releases. The cover artwork is VERY appealing (laminated b/w in the case of "Schüsse ..."), both LPs running times exceed 40 minutes and both are top-collectibles among the not-that-few Jerry Cotton fans still among us today (for those who are not lucky to locate one or both of the near-to-impossible to find LP-releases, the German CD-label Crippled Dick Hot Wax (what a name!) did issue a 2CD-set a few years back, combining both LPs´ tracks; this set contains extensive liner notes and is a must-have, at least in my humble opinion). Since the Jerry Cotton movie-series´ box-office success was already in decline when the second LP was released, no further vinyls followed.

Although the above discussed Jerry Cotton movies were certainly (and still are!) the most successful German crime-thrillers, there were others in the same vein and luckily they did receive a soundtrack-LP-release in some cases: "NEGRESCO" is certainly one of Klaus DOLDINGERs most noteworty efforts, his first soundtrack ever issued and a highly original jazz/beat/funk-score, music not to be heard in Germays theatres until 1967! A top collectible with eye-popping cover artwork! Same production values as the Polydor-releases (top pressing quality on the Liberty-label, cover laminated and on softer cardboard). By the way, the music is so wild and loud, that even a VG-surface should play without any audible moise!

The next one in the crime/thriller-line is a F/O-LP featuring the score from the German/Italian/French co-produced Anthony Perkins/Sophia Loren-flick "Five miles to midnight", so-so directed by craftsman Anatole Litvak in 1966! A real heavy one to locate, this limited print was issued by UA with a breathtaking cover artwork, containg some 40 minutes of music presented in two suites, presumably to promote the movie in Germany. Composed by two top-(jazz-)composers of the era, Mikis Theodorakis of "Alexis Sorbas"-fame and Jaques Loussier, well known for his Louis DeFunes-scores, this nice outing is one that would definily deserve a re-issue (at least on CD ...). Top pressing quality and - as said - great cover artwork, unfortunately on very soft, not laminated "cardboard", make this a tough one to find in nice condition. Actually this item is part of a small series, issued in Germany those days, the other two being equally tough to locate, but not as valuable, since also availabe in other prints: Miklos ROZSAs great effort for "The V.I.P.s" aka "Hotel International" in Germany, and Bernsteins "To kill a mockingbirdd" (soon on this site) aka "Wenn die Nachtigal singt" in Germany. Both feature the same production values as "Five miles...", notably a great fold-out cover!!

Further crime jazz-LPs deserving recommendation are of course Peter Thomas´ 1966-effort "PLAYGIRL" on Polydor, the only Polydor OST-LP-release featuring a cover made from real thick cardboard, a mind-blowing score, incompletely re-issued on a nowadays top rare Peter Thomas 2CD-set from the early 90ies (it contains only the Peter Thomas-tracks, but not the equally enjoyable tracks from his collaborators), closely matched by Bert KAEMPFERTs same-era crime-jazz score for "90 Minuten nach Mitternacht" (= "90 minutes after midnight"), already out on CD by Bear Family (high buying recommendation!), and Germanys Decca-LP-release of "A man could get killed" by the same composer (same artwork as US-pressing on thin not-laminated cardboard, but better pressing quality than the much easier to find US LP). Two more items, which certainly deserve to be mentioned, are the two crime-jazz compilation LPs, "Das Kriminalmagazin" und "Das Kriminalmuseum", issued in the second half of the 60ies and being in heavy demand due to a couple of otherwise unavailable tracks, featuring incredible beat, funk and jazz tunes from various movie and TV-productions from Germanys golden movie-decade!

Last but not least, two more "goodies" from the 60ies deserve to be mentioned: Dusan RADICs highly acclaimed score for the European co-production "Dschinghis Khan" received its worldwide only authentic soundtrack-release on Germanys Liberty-label (again solely for promotinal reasons). Please note that the easily available US-release (also on Liberty) does not contain authentic tracks from the score, but tracks solely recorded for this US-release, conducted by the ever-reliable Muir Mathison (being very faithful to the original, but re-do is re-do ..). The second LP I´d like to put forward in this closing paragraph regarding Germanys 60ies OST-LPs is a real oddity: again on the Liberty-label (liberty Minit!?), Karl BATHELs (Karl-who?) score for the youth-education-flick (yes, that is what Germanys mondo-offspring-movies could be called; just compare "Wunder der Liebe", of which a dialogue LP was made available, and the "Housewife reports" ...!) "Helga and Michael" is a beautiful score with lots of beat in-between, that should really have received a wider distribution. This odd-pressing ranks among the impossible-to-find ones ...

Before finally closing this again rather long introductory statement, two German "societies" do deserve to be mentioned: the MSMS and the MRMS! The Max Steiner Music Society, an off-spring of the US-"headquater", issued a total of 14 (!) LPs in the 80ies, containing numerous scores by Vienna-born golden age-composer Max Steiner, featuring up to then unavailable scores in good pressing quality, but with its share of hiss and surface noise due to the age of the master acetates! Great original poster-reproductions as artwork on soft, but laminated cardboards supplement a really nice presentation for items, that were manufactured in as low a print run as 100 copies! Among the series are three 2-LP-sets and starting point was a up-to-then as complete as possible 3-LP-waxing of Steiners ever-lasting masterpiece "Gone with the wind" aka "Vom Winde verweht" in Germany. This is one I still would need to add to my collection ... The second society is also an offspring of an US-"headquater", the Miklos Rosza Musical Society, which issued - at least two my knowledge - only one item, a 3-LP-set featuring mostly music from "Quo Vadis", again in a minuscule 100 copies print-"run".

Again, more than enough has been said in the above very long "introductory" statement (congrat´s to everybody who read this in one row). Hope you enjoy and let the covers attract your immagination! And if you have any questions, that have been left unanswered (and I am sure there are some ...), please do not hesitate to drop me a line e-mail! I answer all questions as fast as possible, plan to collect them and want to put them into a FAQ-section (which is planned for 2003!). The same goes of course, if you have any info or items for sale or trade available!!

AVAILABLE items (visually graded: cover/record; play-graded upon request):

Polydor 237.422:     Winnetou II/Unter Geiern         (Martin Böttcher), NM/EX   
Telefunken BLE 14367-P: Der Schatz der Azteken/Die Pyramide des Sonnengottes 
                        (Erwin Halletz)                                 M/M
MGM 80001 Hi-Fi:     Hotel International (= The VIPs)  (Miklos Rozsa), M-/M-   
Amiga B 55.655:      Das unsichtbare Visier          (Walter Kubiczek)   M-/M-   
Amiga B xx.xxx:      Heisse Spur                     (Walter Kubiczek)   M-/M-
Selected Sound 126:  Der Puppenspieler               (Philippe Sarde)    M/M   
MGM 665 047:         The yellow Rolls-Royce          (Riz Ortolani)      M/M
Bertelsmann 8093:    Ohne Dich wird es Nacht/Weg ohne Umkehr 
                                                  (Hans-Martin Majewski) M/M
xxx:                 Freddy und das Lied der Prärie (Polydor HiFi 46789) NM/NM                                               

WANTED: Die schwarzen Adler von Santa Fe (Gert Wilden, EP), International INEP 408
       Five miles to midnight (Theodorakis/Loussier on UA F/O LP)
       Sonntags ... nie (Manos Hadjidakis, German LP)