Sony Music Masterworks announces the November 8 release of The Irishman (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, an album of music from the Martin Scorsese-directed film starring Robert De Niro, Al Pacino and Joe Pesci. Available for preorder now, the soundtrack features music carefully curated by Scorsese and music supervisor Randall Poster as a sonic companion to the film's enthralling narrative of organized crime in postwar America. The twenty-track collection includes top hits by legendary artists Fats Domino, Jackie Gleason, Jerry Vale, Johnny Ray, Marty Robbins, Pérez Prado and more, as well as a new theme composed by legendary guitarist and composer Robbie Robertson. Making its critically-acclaimed world premiere at this year's New York Film Festival, The Irishman debuts in theaters today, November 1 and on Netflix beginning Wednesday, November 27.
Of the soundtrack, director Martin Scorsese says, "For me, music is always essential. When I hear the music, I start seeing the images and the world of the movie starts coming together for me. In the case of this movie, it was "In the Still of the Night" by The Five Satins: as we started developing the script I started to hear the song in my head, and it became a key inspiration.
Because music is so essential for me, Robbie and Randy are each close collaborators. I've worked with both of them for many years on many pictures, and there's only one rule that we follow: there are no rules. At a certain point, I went to a piece of music from a French film of the 50s called Touchez pas au Grisbi, a harmonica theme that felt right. And Robbie built his score from that mood, that instrumentation. He started with the harmonica, and then he added the double bass, percussion, and guitar riffs and that was just the right mood. That was it.
Randy and I discussed so much music for this picture. We always do. It's never a matter of just finding music from the time period of the story—I always want to go deeper than that. It's a whole process, an adventure, and Randy's always up for it."
Robert De Niro, Al Pacino and Joe Pesci star in Martin Scorsese's The Irishman, an epic saga of organized crime in post-war America told through the eyes of World War II veteran Frank Sheeran, a hustler and hitman who worked alongside some of the most notorious figures of the 20th century. Spanning decades, the film chronicles one of the greatest unsolved mysteries in American history, the disappearance of legendary union boss Jimmy Hoffa, and offers a monumental journey through the hidden corridors of organized crime: its inner workings, rivalries and connections to mainstream politics.