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https://www.grammy.com/nominees# 60. Best Score Soundtrack For Visual Media Winner Star Wars: The Force Awakens John Williams, composer Congratulations!

Very cool that RJ is going to use the actual score to edit the picture with. Hopefully that means more continuous music and less choppy edits.

RJ gets it! Thank you, sir!

Here, I recreated what his experience might have been like

I wonder if he bothered going

Not really. TFA had John Williams 'chase' the cut as it the score was written and edits were made to the film, as opposed to scoring and then having the movie cut around that score.

Maybe they've done a new 7.1 audio mix for Star Wars, sourcing all the original elements and re-assembling the sound mix? To do that properly, they would've gone back to the original scoring session tapes. IIRC Universal did a similar thing for Jaws when that got a 4K remaster, as the original audio mix was mono.

In a studio! Karol

Over at FSM I saw a 'blink and you'd miss it' post by drivingmissdaisy (Peter Hackman who works for Varese) on Feb 8th that said: Recording sessions are taking place as I type this. I have some friends playing on it. fsm link

That bit in particular reminds me of this part from Williams' American Journey! 3:01 - 3:09 I've heard good things about Paul Lewis' Beethoven. I will certainly take a listen!

Thanks for exploding my ears. Seriously, though, that actually made my day. Thanks for putting it together. It's something I never knew I needed, but now that I have it I can't imagine life without it. Pure gold. Listen from 1:15. EDIT: Listening to normal music feels really great after this, as well. Another benefit.

I absolutely love the first movement of Richard Danielpour's Concerto For Orchestra (Zoroastrian Riddles). It's a crazy mix of Stravinsky, Copland and Bernstein, and some parts sound unmistakably Williams-esque as well. Some cool bits: 0:00 - The mystic opening. 0:26 - Quartal goodness. 1:01 - The double-tonguing woodwinds. 2:03 - Copland's ghost lingering! 3:03 - More Copland (+ whipcrack). 3:16 - Enter Bernstein! 3:26 - A Lydian (the top layer, at least) - very Williams-esque! 3:44 - The spiccato parallel major chords remind me of Thomas Newman. 4:23 - Very cinematic.

Hello everybody, I am a Brazilian film composer and admirer of Jonh's music. I am proud to be here among you and to release my new blog in such a forum. During the past few years I have been studing the compositions of the man which I consider the best film composer of all times. As a result I have gained some knowledge and skills which I beleive should be explored as a resource for others, and, thinking about this, I decided to write a book which I call The John Williams Compositional Techniques. This book is a dream that is becoming true as the project progress towards the many ideas I have been given by the people interested in learning more about Jonh's ability to compose. Today, besides the book, I am preparing a series of lectures as well and for a good start, I decided to put available part of the book in my new blog. In the next few weeks I will be posting once a week something interesting about the book. Mostly they will be exercices and analisys about short fragments of the best scores the composer has written. The first two exercises can be seen here: Creation of Texture 1 Creation of Texture 2 For more details about how they were created and stay updated please visit: http://www.leandrogardini.com/blog Please let me know your requests and opinion about this project. Thank you for you support!

" O.K., um, I will accept the award for John Williams..." Meanwhile Johnny is sitting at home wondering whether to extend the idea in the high winds or move to a different key after measure 17.

Pane E Liberta - Ennio Morricone It's not my first exposure to Morricone, but it's quite a treat. It's somber in places, with heart and optimism running throughout. I can see why he's so beloved in the international film community, he really adds another layer to the films he works on.

Oh, OK. I've never watched the Grammys. I just remembered the Academy's little nod to Williams with the droids at their last awards show - even though he didn't even win. But I guess that makes sense - Williams has always been generally appreciated more in the domain of film than music, it seems. And that's only increased as what's commonly viewed as music has shifted farther and farther away from Williams' style, I assume.

that was pathetic

I was raised to believe it was most ideal when a director has a final cut of the film pretty much locked before scoring sessions begin, but I guess that's not terribly realistic for modern day CGI-fests.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens This score is so good. It has the thematic mastery of the original trilogy, but maintains the ambiance that made the prequels so awesome. Rad

Absolutely not going to happen. They've moved more and more of the actual awards to pre-show announcements over the years as the telecast itself has become more of a live pop variety show. But I'd venture to say that they've never presented the Best Score award on the telecast, so it's not like it's a new thing.

Well done JW! The Grammy's doing what the Oscars don't.

Well I'll be darned, didn't expect him to win. Congratulations Mr. Williams on your 23rd (!!) Grammy!

Fiddler on the Roof is good but I prefer Fiedler on the Roof:

Is this the same thing they are talking about on FSM? https://mobile.twitter.com/BurnettRM/status/830816741726969856

And as a neighbor to the east in New Brunswick (the apparently "bilingual province") I'm always surprised how many primarily English speakers also live in Quebec! Not that it's a problem but the province is primarily seen as a Francais only spot. Either way, with what has happened here in Quebec in the past little while, Bespin is right, we are all a little raw but glad we've got JWfan to escape to... most of the time Now back to topic as I go dig out my copy of Fiddler

Coincidentally. Catch Me If You Can is on BBC2 here in the UK right now.

Banging the drum for one of Goldie's most brilliant thriller concoctions, albeit one that is more a feast for academics than for feelgood listeners. With a chilling cimbalom effect and ice cold string figures, this may be one of the most unnerving discordant orchestral suspense scores and while it's heavy on Bartok, what Goldsmith builds out of his handful of flexible motifs is nothing short of breathtaking. To quote Filmtracks, "If you're investigating Coma because you seek a pleasant score, you're deranged." But if you are willing to lose yourself in a 50-minute journey into the dead of night, it doesn't get much better than that.

I think another fantasy series wouldn't do. I always thought his artistic success of Tolkien films came not from working on the huge blockbuster even movie but because he liked the book. You need to give Shore free reign and some artistic concept in order to get the best out of him. He needs to work with someone like Terrence Malick, even if that means his work gets rejected. His concert works are probably more enjoyable than than many of his film scores anyway. Can't wait to get this disc when it comes out on Friday. Karol

The fifth article of The John Williams Compositional Techniques blog has been published. This week the subject is: The Williams Modulating Themes Click here: https://www.leandrogardini.com/single-post/2017/02/12/The-Williams-Modulating-Themes Minority Report Seven Years in Tibet

I enjoyed that video more than I probably should have. At first I wasn't sure why the AOTC and ROTS main titles were included since they are the same recording and mix as the TPM titles, then I realized it contains all the music after the main titles too. Really points out how different of an opening ROTS was to the five films that came before it

Terrible! Such a stupid movie that just got stupider as it went, with the ending being the worst part of the whole movie. I can't believe they want to make a sequel! ScarJo should stear clear of the Lucy "franchise" and focuse on Ghost in the Shell and Black Widow movies

And the piano diddles: This is what I get when I mock up our combined transcriptions in the previous post: http://picosong.com/GsVm/

Hi Disney, can you put back the SE versions of the scores on Spotify, or release new expanded sets quickly, my playlists don't work anymore!

Rian Johnson is his new friend.

I'm not entirely convinced. Wait a second. ------------------------------------------------------------- Okay, I agree now, @LampPost. http://picosong.com/GsPH/ Slowed down and transposed 10 semitones up (+ a high cut), you can clearly hear the stack of fifths. ------------------------------------------------------------ Using the same method (though reversed, i.e. low cut, transposition down 10 semitones) I've noticed the right hand is slightly different, though, @LampPost.

Just re-record the whole original trilogy and be done with it!

Just look at the behind-the-scenes photos from the OT. Most of the people working on it just look like young hippies goofing off. Young hippies that made a masterpiece film series though!

Sounds like typical FSM silliness. Williams was celebrating his birthday with friends that day.

This might be worth a trip or four to New York.

Stefancos, it's the name of a Province in Canada (the only one where french is the official language). It's where I live, look under my avatar. We are 8 millions. It's also the name of it's capital, Québec city.

*fade to black... JW's Jurassic Park interlude plays... the inverted main theme on piano... ... Everything is right with the world, for a time.*

Sayuri's theme may be simple, but Chio's theme is wonderfully complex and the true heart of the score. It's brilliant

I view the theme as a haiku of sorts, especially the way the simple call-and-answer phrases are structured. Its "simplicity" makes it a more accessible vessel around which Williams can paint. It's, as you said, a work about colour and texture, to reflect the landscape and culture Williams was scoring. And the theme flirts around these textures, like a river or a stream flowing through the changing soundscapes of the score. It's one of his most impressionist scores, bearing more resemblance to his concert work than the usual. There's something awfully trance-like about all of it. One of his most "visual" scores, if you follow me.

Maybe you heard them at the same time and that's why they sounded dissonant?

In honour of the Maestro's birthday yesterday: By Request: The Best of John Williams and Boston Pops The Spielberg/Williams Collaboration Williams on Williams: The Classic Spielberg Scores Dracula The Fury Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens Far and Away

The fourth article has been released in the blog. This time the subject is the John Williams harmonic language. "One of the main aspects that defines the personal style of a composer is his harmonic language. Many composers in the history have used certain kinds of harmonies and, in many cases, even sequence of chords." cont... https://www.leandrogardini.com/single-post/2017/02/04/The-John-Williams-Harmonic-Language Video:

A new article has just been posted on The John Williams Compositional Techniques. This week we are going to discuss some aspects of how to compose ala Jurassic Park style and apply them to an scene. Enjoy: https://www.leandrogardini.com/single-post/2017/01/27/Scoring-in-Jurassic-Park-Style-1 Thank you! The scene: The video score:

The second article has been posted in the blog. This week I've analyzed one famous Star Wars battle between Obi Wan and Jango Fett. Using many of the John Williams action cue techniques described in the book, the Creation of Texture exercise has been applied to the actual movie scene. To have access to the full explanation click in the link below: https://www.leandrogardini.com/single-post/2017/01/20/Creation-of-Texture-Part-II---Applied-to-Scene Video: