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Most UNDERrated Williams Scores


John Crichton

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'Underrated' can be defined in different ways, but I would argue that only a handful of mentions in this thread qualify.

Personally, I would count many of his 60s efforts, especially the loungey jazz stuff which is absolutely brilliant. Also, a score like STORIA DI UNA DONNA is some of the best he's ever done, IMO, but it's hardly ever talked about due to its extreme rarity. Or some of the superb stuff on ALCOA PREMIERE.

JANE EYRE and IMAGES are some of his best and most interesting too, but enjoys a LOT of respect, at least among the connaiseurs. So not sure if they qualify as 'underrated' if you take 'rated' to mean some sort of qualitative judgement. More like 'not as wellknown as it should be to the public at large'.

In the last four decades, there are any number of scores that aren't talked about as much as the big titles, but not necessarily 'underrated'. I mean, ANGELA'S ASHES is drop-dead gorgeous and one of my personal JW favourites, but is it underrated?

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Born On The Fourth Of July, at least underrated when people are talking about Williams' masterpieces. You'll always hear Jaws, Star Wars, Superman or Raiders get a mention, but hardly anyone places Born On The Fourth Of July among those undisputed classic scores. It may lack the world famous themes, but it is -next to Schindler's List- Williams' most powerful drama score. It deserves more praise and exposure than it nowadays gets. It also should have won the Academy Award over The Little Mermaid.

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SpaceCamp is pretty underrated here. I don't really understand why. It's Williams doing what he does best.

It's so vanilla. It's like John Williams' Amazing Story scores (excluding the fantastic "Amazing Stories" theme). There are several Williamsy ingredients that are reminiscent of his classics but none of the memorability or emotional punch. It's a limp noodle.

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I would trim 7 minutes off SpaceCamp's album. Bring it down to a perfect 42 minute length. As for Amazing Stories: The Mission, it's like 30 minutes total and better than most Williams scores twice or more that length.

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It depends on who's doing the rating. Jane Eyre is absolutely amazing, but I don't think it's underrated here, just among the general public. Ditto Nixon. Revenge of the Sith is my personal favorite JW score, but I don't think you could really call it underrated since it's still a Star Wars score. For something underrated even among Williams fans I'd probably go with Lincoln or The Eiger Sanction.

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Lincoln is definitely underappreciated by some members here, dismissed as boring or whatever. Extreme bullshit. It's a breathtaking score, every note is "right."

I think the same criticism is unfairly extended to The Book Thief as well.

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Lincoln is not the most exciting Williams score, but it's probably his most respectful. I enjoy its subtle precision.

The Book Thief on the other hand I find lacking in complexity and largely a retread of Williams' older efforts, even if it is very superficially pretty. Not a bad score, as no such thing exists for Williams, but one of his less interesting efforts.

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Am I the only one who thinks several of his 60s efforts are underrated? It seem like most of you are only mentioning stuff from the last 3 or 4 decades.

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Lincoln is not the most exciting Williams score, but it's probably his most respectful. I enjoy its subtle precision.

The Book Thief on the other hand I find lacking in complexity and largely a retread of Williams' older efforts, even if it is very superficially pretty. Not a bad score, as no such thing exists for Williams, but one of his less interesting efforts.

Agreed on both counts. But as an addendum, I'd like to add that no matter how pedestrian The Book Thief would seem in Johnny's long list of music, its still far and away better than the overwhelming majority of other composers and songwriters.

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Lost in Space. I think myself, king mark, maybe Thor and a few others are fans.

Well, there are many other things from the 60s that I would put before that, but it's certainly some of the most avantgarde stuff he's done, and that makes it very fascinating. Not sure if it's underrated, though, since it seems to have a HUGE fanbase.

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Am I the only one who thinks several of his 60s efforts are underrated? It seem like most of you are only mentioning stuff from the last 3 or 4 decades.

Oh, do you like his 60s stuff?

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Am I the only one who thinks several of his 60s efforts are underrated? It seem like most of you are only mentioning stuff from the last 3 or 4 decades.

Oh, do you like his 60s stuff?

Ha, ha....yeah, I think I've made that point once or twice before.

But seriously, sometimes I feel like this board only acknowledges Williams' career from 1975 onwards, forgetting that he has almost 20 years of occasionally fantastic music before that.

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I find both his scores and concert music from the early days to just be a bit uninteresting. There was still something lacking despite obvious promise and skill. The flute concerto and Images or The Eiger Sanction seem like the turning points for me. It's when the real "Williams perspective" seemed to be established.

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Wow, so many members in this thread who are no longer active. Things have changed quite a bit in the last ten years.

I'm glad we've put those primitive years behind us.

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I find both his scores and concert music from the early days to just be a bit uninteresting. There was still something lacking despite obvious promise and skill. The flute concerto and Images or The Eiger Sanction seem like the turning points for me. It's when the real "Williams perspective" seemed to be established.

I agree with you here, although I very much enjoy and have studied his Sinfonietta for wind orchestra.

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