Outside of anime fandom, the works of Hayao Miyazaki mean "Japanese animation" to many people. As such, his works can have an outside impact on how the average film-going public view the medium of anime. While his films are generally excellent from a visual and story-telling perspective, Hayao Miyazaki himself does not score the music for his films, though, so another artist must add the aural polish to Miyazaki's films.

Enter Joe Hisaishi, a composer who has worked on musical scores for dozens of films, and the composer of the background music for all of Hayao Miyazaki's films. Outside of the fact that Mr. Hisaishi is an excellent composer of symphonic music, the fact that Hayao Miyazaki's films are always scored by the same man provides another layer of commonality and consistency to his films.

With that in mind, let's look at the soundtrack to Miyazaki's 1989 film, Kiki's Delivery Service, my personal favorite of his films so far. The film itself is very down to earth. There are no aliens invading the planet, no giant robots fighting interstellar wars (for peace, naturally), no blue-haired moe girls, or any of the current anime tropes. The world isn't quite the real one, though. It turns out that the world of Kiki's Delivery Serivce is populated by witches (of the Bewitched variety), who have a custom of leaving home as teenagers, to establish themselves through their own hard work. Kiki is one such witch, who leaves home at the beginning of the film, lands in an unnamed city, and then proceeds to do what she can to better her skills and establish herself.

With a storyline like that, the composer doesn't have to work with a wide variety of moods, and can simply focus on music to provide a unique feel to the world. To match the architectural designs used in the film (generally a mix of modern (for the '80s) and late 19th century generic European designs), the composer uses a mix of Viennese-style accordion, rinky-dink piano, and full orchestra. The music is generally happy, lively stuff, though there are exceptions. For example, one scene in the film involves an old dog who moves slowly. The background music here features a tuba, which works wonderfully with the animal's character. Also, about two-thirds of the way through the film the main character becomes depressed, and the music follows suit. In addition, the end of the film includes a few minutes of dramatic danger, and thus a couple tracks late in the album turn rather dramatic and foreboding, to provide extra emotion to the scene.

The thing that I immediately noticed about this album when I first listened to it is how mellow the thing is - mostly. This is a great album for just listening to if you want to unwind after a hard day of work, or just want to have a relaxing hour on a beautiful Saturday afternoon. The music gives a very hopeful, optimistic feel without being perky or overly energetic. A great example of this is track 11, Osono’s Request. It's pretty slow and mellow, but never ceases to make me smile, no matter what is going on at the time I'm listening to it. Another good example is track 14, naturally enough named Heartbroken Kiki, which is one of the more melancholy numbers on the album. This track properly captures Kiki's melancholy funk, and the next couple tracks capture her attempts to get out of it. This track is a bit sad, but it is also rather short, so it really feels like a road sign indicating a change in direction, without really diving off the deep end and changing the feel of the album.

The fact that there are different moods in the tracks on this album could be a big problem, but in fact it is not, due to the skill of the composer. No matter the mood, all of the tracks feel like they fit together due to the use of common musical signatures. For example, the beginning of track 18, The Old Man’s Deck Brush, is similar to the beginning of track 3, A Town with an Ocean View, in its composition; track 18 is simply more urgent and foreboding. Because the music has these similarities, it all fits together, making the album as a whole a coherent and enjoyable listening experience.

I would be remiss if I didn't note that the last two tracks on the album are the vocal songs that open and end the film. Well, the ones that do in the original Japanese version of the film, anyway. Disney's English dub, while good, replaces these songs with ones sung in English, and they are not included on this album, as this is a Japanese soundtrack. The first one, Message of Rouge, has a bit of a '60s pop vibe to it, which I must admit isn't my thing. The second one, If I've Been Enveloped by Tenderness, has more of a folk-pop vibe to it, and is more up my alley. It makes an excellent end to the film, and this album.

As you can probably tell, I very much enjoy the soundtrack to Kiki's Delivery Service. I like it because it is the soundtrack to one of my favorite films, but also because the album stands on its own as an excellent listening album, accessible to many people. Highly recommended.