Australian pop musician and producer turned film composer David Hirschfelder garnered an Academy Award nomination for the impressive pop and classical musical alchemy he conjured up for Shine. For Elizabeth (director Shekhar Kapur's nouveau-feminist take on the political and religious barrier-breaking rise of Queen Elizabeth I), Hirschfelder has again imbued familiar period-music clichés with just enough pop rhythmic and melodic flourishes to create a score that's fresh yet deceptively familiar. To his credit, Hirschfelder wears his influences proudly, interpolating Mozart, Elgar, Byrd, and Susato into his own, modern, sensibilities with seamless aplomb (only Holst's "Mars, the Bringer of War" seems trotted out just once too often). The composer (who also orchestrated) walks a fine musical line on Elizabeth, ultimately creating a musical fusion of the best kind. --Jerry McCulley