Arnaud

While we are learning absolutely nothing about John Williams in any of Augie's posts in this thread, we will eventually learn a lot about Augie. That is, once he lets us on the joke or it becomes certain he is not joking. I hope for him he is joking because he speaks of John Williams like some sort of god in which he used to believe until he suddenly saw the light and found the "truth". That is no way to appreciate any artist, even for a fan. (That may be the very point Augie intends to make. If so, it's a bit heavy-handed, don't you think?) Finally I like it that Augie mentions that John Williams writes too many notes. Some people complained to Mozart that he wrote too many notes. So I guess Augie just showed us that it takes very little provocation to start a heated thread. In fact, it takes so little - as is to be expected - that he didn't even need to display much manipulative or creative talents. So we may have learned a couple of things about Augie already: he likes a good joke but he is a bit lazy about it! ;>) Personally, I love John Williams and his music and I couldn't care less what anybody else thinks about him and his music. I like to share it with other people. Some people get it and some people don't. That is the way of the world and that is just fine. What music people like generally says a lot about them too.

Hi all, Twenty-some years ago I purchased a cd of rare film music for very popular movies: It's a Wonderful Life (Tiomkin), A Christmas Carol (Addinsell) and Miracle on 34th Street (Mockridge). Robert Redford's Sundance Institute financed the reconstruction and recording of the scores under the direction of David Newman. It's a great cd published by TELARC, Volume 1 in the "Sundance Institute Film Music Series". As far as I know, there's never been a volume 2. Does anybody know if the Sundance Institute continued its efforts to save and promote film scores? Have they organized concerts in conjunction with their annual festival or on any other occasions? Arnaud

I would say Return of the Jedi was the most anticipated film of all. We really had to wait three full years for it while Empire wasn't announced until a few months after Star Wars was released and we were still basking in the total surprise that it had been. Seeing it again and again... I saw it seven times in its first year! Empire blew us all away and set the bar so high. Star Wars wasn't just a one off after all, it was going to be a high quality saga. Had the second film been a bad film, we would have moved on, successful sequels or not. With Empire, some of us were hooked for life. The next couple of years of waiting were very long indeed. Thank God Raiders, E.T. and quite a few other great films helped. To answer a few questions from the original post, it was a given that the opening fanfare would be the same after the release of the LP. Also Time Magazine had published a picture of the opening crawl so there was no surprise there either (except for the incredible mention of it being in fact Episode V...). Incidently, early storyboards show that for a while Lucas toyed with the idea of opening the film on a white snowy background rather than a star field. I, too, read the ESB novelization but had the will to stop half-way so as not to spoil it. In the end a stupid french magazine published a photo of Luke and Vader dueling and the caption casually said: 'During this fight Luke finds out Darth Vader is his father'...! I was taken aback and not sure I should believe it but writing that was a very stupid thing to do. The article was unsigned and to this day I hold a grudge! :>) And I still hesitate to mention that Vader is Luke's father in public! I wouldn't want to be the one spoiling it for someone... Upon seeing Empire the first time, I distinctly remember being completely surprised by the sound made by the imperial probe at the beginning of the film when it flies to Hoth and how the sound seemed to travel from one area to the other. That was so new to me. And it was a perfect way to transport me to another galaxy. The feeling of total other worldliness that was so strong with Star Wars was working again from the very first scene. Wow! The rest was just two short hours of walking on clouds. And the next three years an exercise in patience... Obviously, the big cliffhanger didn't help. In the end return of the Jedi was a big let-down. It had enough to keep me interested but a lot of things were wrong with it. It was not in the same spirit of quality and intelligence that the previous two had been. It felt it needed a Special Edition of some kind, like Close Encounters (except CE3K didn't really need one). Jedi felt like it was an accident. We put our hopes in the prequels but they took forever and, obviously, that is another story!

Too many to choose from. So: Yesterday: Audience with the Holy Father from Monsignor. Today: The Levitation from Return of the Jedi. Tomorrow: probably the Finale and Theme from JFK.

Wow, thank you for posting this! I've already listened to it three times. This movie is impossible to find and I've often wondered about it and its music. From the very start there is a great theme very similar to one from Close Encounters. It makes it familiar and new at once. Beautiful work.