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Which Cues Showcase JW's Use of Synth?


Will

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Please don't get too technical about synth because I know barely anything about it. :)

 

Also, it would be nice if you'd provide time stamps and be very specific about where you hear it. 

 

TheWhiteRider, Sharkus Malarkus, and Jilal, take it away! ;)

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Can't find it without the narration....

 

 

I love the airy quasi-choral/vocal thing that he does like at 2:48 and and 3:19...

 

 

...and at 0:34 here.

 

 

His classic "ghostly" synth thing throughout this.

 

 

 

And throughout A.I.  You must simply listen to the whole thing, no examples!

 

OK, one example.  My favorite electronic moment in Williams' whole output is, I think, at 2 minutes into Of Course I'm Not Sure.  I'd like to explain why, but I find it very difficult to put into words.  It's rivaled only by the later The Specialist Visits, which features synths on some utterly sublime musical gestures at 0:43 and 0:52.

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1 hour ago, Disco Stu said:

God I love the Minority Report soundtrack

Dare I say it's AWESOME!

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His score for Presumed Innocent I think has some of my favorite instances of synth from Williams, especially within the main theme. It's fairly subdued for the most part, and may sound quite dated given it's from 26 years ago, but I love it all the same. 
 

 

I love how we get a burst of synth at around 0:30, and then from 0:35 or so to 1:30 it's all orchestra, and then we switch back to all synth for a bit. The piano begins to creep in, followed by the strings, and then for 15 seconds or so we have this glorious merger of both synth and orchestra. It's just fun seeing Williams "go Borg" for a moment, doing a great job at combining both the synthetic and the natural for an instance. The effect is rather haunting, I'd say. 

 

Quieter bits of the main theme can be heard in this track, also with synthy goodness:

 

Here's hoping that Ready Player One gives us a few more cool synth moments from him!  

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As the examples so far show, Williams tends to use synths discretely (I know, I'm Captain Obvious!), which I think is wonderful, and why I will always prefer his approach over someone like Goldsmith's. There are are times where synths are more upfront -- like the techno bit in A.I. (sadly not composed by Williams), "The Conspirators" from JFK or the "Training Montage" from SPACE CAMP (which I soooo hope is by Williams himself, just for the fun of it), but they belong to the exceptions.

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4 hours ago, Cerebral Cortex said:

His score for Presumed Innocent I think has some of my favorite instances of synth from Williams, especially within the main theme. It's fairly subdued for the most part, and may sound quite dated given it's from 26 years ago, but I love it all the same. 
 

 

I love how we get a burst of synth at around 0:30, and then from 0:35 or so to 1:30 it's all orchestra, and then we switch back to all synth for a bit. The piano begins to creep in, followed by the strings, and then for 15 seconds or so we have this glorious merger of both synth and orchestra. It's just fun seeing Williams "go Borg" for a moment, doing a great job at combining both the synthetic and the natural for an instance. The effect is rather haunting, I'd say. 

 

 

Here's hoping that Ready Player One gives us a few more cool synth moments from him!  

While that is not from the original soundtrack but a re-recording, I do agree that some of the subtle synth work is excellent in Presumed Innocent.

 

 

30 minutes ago, Thor said:

As the examples so far show, Williams tends to use synths discretely (I know, I'm Captain Obvious!), which I think is wonderful, and why I will always prefer his approach over someone like Goldsmith's. There are are times where synths are more upfront -- like the techno bit in A.I. (sadly not composed by Williams), "The Conspirators" from JFK or the "Training Montage" from SPACE CAMP (which I soooo hope is by Williams himself, just for the fun of it), but they belong to the exceptions.

You haven't heard the music for the Dr. Know sequence from A.I. have you Thor have you? Now that is all synth stuff of the weirdest and funniest kind. The score contains those classic rather subtle synth textures Williams often enhances his scores with, either providing support for an instrumental family in the orchestra, a single instrument or refining their sound.

 

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Yes, I've heard the "Dr. Know" music, of course, and I agree -- that's another example of a Williams piece where synth is more upfront. Good example! Didn't "Mr. DNA" from JURASSIC PARK also this kind of whimsical synth quality, or do memories deceive me (perhaps it was just orchestral)?

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17 minutes ago, Thor said:

Yes, I've heard the "Dr. Know" music, of course, and I agree -- that's another example of a Williams piece where synth is more upfront. Good example! Didn't "Mr. DNA" from JURASSIC PARK also this kind of whimsical synth quality, or do memories deceive me (perhaps it was just orchestral)?

The piece from JP "Cartoon Demonstration" is called Stalling Around by JW on the 20th anniversary release of the score and it is a pure homage to the grand old man of cartoon scoring Carl Stalling and is all orchestral.

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5 hours ago, Richard said:

...and what synth plays the really low notes, as Luke arrives at Jabba's palace?

 

ARP 2600. Probably two or three detuned square wave oscillators sent through a closed low-pass filter, 35ms delay with modulation at around 7hz, sent through a flanger pedal with the resonance pretty high, then maybe DI'd into the mixing console.

 

Big up to tedfud for that info. :up:

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2 hours ago, Incanus said:

The piece from JP "Cartoon Demonstration" is called Stalling Around by JW on the 20th anniversary release of the score and it is a pure homage to the grand old man of cartoon scoring Carl Stalling and is all orchestral.

 

Thanks. I've only seen the movie, like, 60 times, so kinda embarassing that I didn't remember. I obviously don't have the expansion, where I believe this cue was included.

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Great examples all around.

 

What's remarkable to me is how often Williams scores from about the 90s forward call for synths that really fly below the radar. Jurassic Park, the prequels, the Potter scores, you name it - there are a lot of synth doublings all over the place, not to mention acoustic-sounding elements like the omnipresent Harry Potter celeste, which is of course provided via a synthesizer, too.

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45 minutes ago, Datameister said:

omnipresent Harry Potter celeste, which is of course provided via a synthesizer, too.

 

Wait, there isn't a single actual celeste anywhere in the Williams Potter scores?

 

I somehow didn't know that.  I guess that's the case for Rey's Theme too.

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37 minutes ago, Disco Stu said:

 

Wait, there isn't a single actual celeste anywhere in the Williams Potter scores?

 

I somehow didn't know that.  I guess that's the case for Rey's Theme too.

 

Actually, Kerber's synth celeste is a mixture of samples of an actual celeste with a sine wave, so there is, although in sampled form.

 

By the way, you can purchase it from Cinesamples (for $99, I believe).

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It's a celeste preset from the DX7 plus a sine wave IIRC. Williams began using MIDI stacking (combining different patches from different synths) in the late 80s on scores like The Witches of Eastwick.

 

58 minutes ago, Muad'Dib said:

 

 

 

Love that wine glasses/cristal baschet patch. There's an almost identifical sound when Obi Wan's hiding out at the bottom of the sinkhole in ROTS.

 

Has anyone tried to recreate Kerber's animal noise synth patches heard in TLW and TPM? 

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6 hours ago, Sharkus Malarkus said:

 

ARP 2600. Probably two or three detuned square wave oscillators sent through a closed low-pass filter, 35ms delay with modulation at around 7hz, sent through a flanger pedal with the resonance pretty high, then maybe DI'd into the mixing console.

 

Big up to tedfud for that info. :up:

 

DI, huh? Makes sense. Ta for that!!

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9 hours ago, Thor said:

As the examples so far show, Williams tends to use synths discretely (I know, I'm Captain Obvious!), which I think is wonderful, and why I will always prefer his approach over someone like Goldsmith's. There are are times where synths are more upfront -- like the techno bit in A.I. (sadly not composed by Williams), "The Conspirators" from JFK or the "Training Montage" from SPACE CAMP (which I soooo hope is by Williams himself, just for the fun of it), but they belong to the exceptions.

 

What about the Precrime Advert? That all synths, isn't it?

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Thanks for all the examples!

 

Some questions:

 

Do most JW cues use synth? 

 

Can you give me some examples of some of the more famous Williams cues where synth is used in a barely noticeable role (like there is a big thematic statement and perhaps there's some subtle but important synth in the bass region?)

 

How does it work when Williams wants some synth? Would he say/write something to the effect of, "I want a synth that sounds like a cow," and then Randy Kerber would actually figure out how to make that sound?

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It's "synths" not the singular "synth."  Short for synthesizer, which is any number of instruments that create sound through various forms of synthesis.

 

Having worked with Kerber for quite a while, Randy knows Williams' descriptive shorthand and what sounds are appropriate to match them.  They're usually just words on the keyboard/synth parts like "ghostly" or "glassy" or "voices."  Often they call for electric piano and sampled/synthesized celesta or percussion as well.  There are a number of recurring sounds you can recognize in different scores.  Surely whenever Williams wants something new, he sits down with Randy to figure it out.

 

I believe Nord keyboards have been featured lately, but others may have better information on Kerber's favored gear.

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6 hours ago, Sharkus Malarkus said:

 

Or the creepy cows mooing here.

 

 

 

I always thought that was some kind of flute. Cool to know it's a synth!

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13 hours ago, Disco Stu said:

 

Wait, there isn't a single actual celeste anywhere in the Williams Potter scores?

 

 

 I remember an interview where Willliams talks about the celestes and describes it as a small piano with pedals and difficult to play, so there must be a real one

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1 hour ago, king mark said:

 I remember an interview where Willliams talks about the celestes and describes it as a small piano with pedals and difficult to play, so there must be a real one

 

Well.  Yes.  There is.  

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I've always been curious what that weird "ghostly" synth chorus was in the film version of "Yoda Strikes Back"... the part when Dooku collapses the ceiling on Yoda. Anyone have any idea what type of synth that is? It doesn't seem to have any sort of discernable notes, just like someone randomly pressing keys on a keyboard.

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5 hours ago, TheWhiteRider said:

It's "synths" not the singular "synth."  Short for synthesizer, which is any number of instruments that create sound through various forms of synthesis.

 

Having worked with Kerber for quite a while, Randy knows Williams' descriptive shorthand and what sounds are appropriate to match them.  They're usually just words on the keyboard/synth parts like "ghostly" or "glassy" or "voices."  Often they call for electric piano and sampled/synthesized celesta or percussion as well.  There are a number of recurring sounds you can recognize in different scores.  Surely whenever Williams wants something new, he sits down with Randy to figure it out.

 

I believe Nord keyboards have been featured lately, but others may have better information on Kerber's favored gear.

 

Exactly, I don't think we truly can speak of 'John Williams, the synthman'. He has people for that.

 

 

Lead and bass

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9 hours ago, king mark said:

 I remember an interview where Willliams talks about the celestes and describes it as a small piano with pedals and difficult to play, so there must be a real one

 

There are a couple of cues that briefly call for an actual acoustic celeste in a supporting role, but all of the iconic moments that prominently feature the instrument are done with a synthesizer.

 

Of course, Williams is very familiar with real celestes and has called for them in numerous scores. But starting in about the 90s, it mostly switched to synth.

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8 hours ago, Alexcremers said:

 

Exactly, I don't think we truly can speak of 'John Williams, the synthman'. He has people for that.

 

 

Lead and bass

 

So that's by Williams himself? It's great stuff in any case. 

 

As a side note, Heartbeeps is a score I'd never heard until yesterday and now I'm in love with it. Crimebuster - :wub:. That awesome low synth beat gleefully mixed with full orchestral writing that has such an excitement to it. :music:

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46 minutes ago, Will said:

As a side note, Heartbeeps is a score I'd never heard until yesterday and now I'm in love with it. Crimebuster - :wub:. That awesome low synth beat gleefully mixed with full orchestral writing that has such an excitement to it. :music:

 

I like you!

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