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Yo I found it! Nowhere near in depth as the Empire Strikes Back documentary, as you might imagine (it even cribs from that one!). This is more of a news profile, but here's a brief little glimpse.

Crap, Jaws 2 is on here too!?

I remember when we would just answer idle conundrums like these with "the Force". That used to be enough to affectionately satiate any plot quandary, until the internet came along. Simpler times.

Seriously? No. Not if you have two toddlers around you, long office hours, business travels and a gym routine. You tend to pile up your newest acquisitions until you find the right time to open up your cds as well as occasionally revisit other cds from your collection. Don't make presumptuous. It's tough when you have little time and a blazing passion for your music and a Life.

Ugh another dump of redundant filler tracks.

The Force was the equivalent to "He's Batman" explanation by fantrolls to explain away the plotholes in Nolan's Batman movies.

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Interesting!

Interesting new interview with Anne-Sophie: https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/articles/2824--interview-anne-sophie-mutter-on-john-williams She also reveals why the Devil’s Dance isn’t on the album.

I did see Williams from far after the rehearsals today! I was close to his car and had a talk with the security. They moved the car so I couldn’t come close. Then he came out and stept in the car. I was the only fan there but no chance to get a autograph! 😔

Just started listening to this. It's certainly an experience! Not everything in Rey's theme is played perfectly, but it's quite special to hear it all. If this level of music is kept up, I'm buying the deluxe. I'll do one half today and then continue with Boston Film Night.

Most of them.

Got my VPN set to New Zealand and now listening to the album. Wow, Donnybrook Fair is superb! That’s the first one that jumped out at me that I hadn’t heard previously. Can’t wait for the deluxe edition!

WTF! I have a bad feeling about this & sense a great disturbance with this force!

I dunno, it was pretty amazing that Luke could suddenly fly an x-wing and blow up the Death Star. Or a young 10 year old could pilot a ship and destroy a trade federation vessel. TFA was just following the trend Lucas established.

Asked about which classical composer he will play, in an upcoming biopic, Arnold Schwarzenegger replied: "I'll be Bach".

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I just put Rey's ability down to the idea that she's this untapped near elemental level of power without ever realising it. Prior to that, she'd had a survivor's attitude and little option but to quickly learn how to look after herself. The "accelerated learning" thing never dawned on me as being an issue, until I picked up on it online. But then I just passed that off as the usual nerdy nitpicking you see whenever these movies so much as fart in the wrong direction.

Like always with Junkie's scores, you get the feeling someone's just learning the rudimentary ropes of music-making along the way. Unsuccessfully.

Perhaps I should've prefaced that comment by saying there are advances made by both men and women that are truly forms of harassment and abuse - I know people who are personally affected by this in the workplace and encounter this often, however there are people who, for whatever reason, really believe you can be raped through perceived micro-agressions. Those people are who my post refers to, those who are deluded into thinking someone who looks at another person, or gives a simple greeting is the equivalent of rape. It muddies the water of real victims who suffer from rape. But yeah, ban me.

Just watched the first Spider-Man movie. Just such an awesome film. Jesus, what happened to movies?

Discouraging!

Oh no, JW's dog ate the score.

It’s the composer’s desired presentation, Thor. You will listen to it front-to-back and you will like it!

The Fury, Honey I Blew Up the Kid, E.T, Jaws 2, The Omen, Return to Oz, The Rocketeer...

I quite liked the first score, but then again I haven't listened to any other horror film scores (mainly because I don't generally watch horror films at all anwyay).

A million ways to die in the west. I AM LOVING THIS!

Only 4 tracks in but this album is stunning! The additional material for Hedwig's Theme isn't the lush orchestral presentation I expected, but something far darker and twisted. Suited to the more violent aspects of the Potter series post-Williams; I had to keep reminding myself this was a theme from film one because this arrangement for violin has great echoes of Azkaban far more than either Columbus score. Across the Stars is a revised version of the arrangement we heard last year. The tweaks are subtle in places, more obvious in others, but they're still interesting! Haven't done a direct comparison with the last performance yet, but just so taken aback by the clarity of this gorgeous recording. Again, a far darker and more melancholic interpretation of this piece than originally envisioned for AOTC. This version has an extended violin solo towards the end I don't recall hearing in the previous revision. This makes me yearn for more exploration of this theme, beyond the customary cameos we got in ROTS. This arrangement is far less a love theme, far more an elegy.

Flesh+Blood by Basil Poledouris Damien: Omen II by Jerry Goldsmith Sleepers by John Williams Hard Rain by Christopher Young

Like I said, it sounds to me to be one of the buildup phrases in Forest Battle, somewhere either halfway or in the end. I _know_ I've heard it in the score somewhere.

I'm not against you on the point of a book having the space to elaborate, however, no filmmaker is asking the audience to read the novels in order to understand something that can easily be done in a film. Rey's abilities could've been worked into a conversation, or a montage, or even a flashback to show her life beforehand. I like the small scenes of her washing the scavenged parts and seeing herself in the old woman, thinking that her life would be resigned to scavenging - that's filmmaking that's revealing more than it's showing and says a lot about the character without dialogue and lengthy exposition. Nor do I. The opening crawl of TFA doesn't do enough to show this and I kind of feel that we needed some character to be as clueless as we are to be able to ask the questions and have them answered on screen - shit, Leia or Han could've said something about the rise of the FO and Resistance and we're left to assume Rey knows about the First Order having spent her whole life on one planet...

Makes it look more cinematic.

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A lot of Rey's skills are explained in a pre-TFA book that was released before the movie was out. Therefore it cannot be a reactionary retcon based on fan complaints, but has to be part of the actual story as originally intended. They must simply have decided that a limited length means that explaining/showing EVERYTHING works against the flow of the movie. And I agree. Nothing wrong with leaving some things to the imagination. Define "excel". It's quite possible to be pretty good at something right from the start. But you're right that practice can make it better still.

We should fill this thread with as many clips we can find of Williams playing his tunes solo! Where's that clip of him playing Long Goodbye for Last Jedi? Here's a short one from Superman:

Here you go!

I say it's incredibly lucky we got anything like this, and I'd rather have an official iso-like album than have the pittance we normally get.

Oh Mark, you are such a nationalist d*ckhead. I'm glad how JW stop him

@Nick Parker I don't have sufficient evidence to say that's happening here, my initial comment was a jibe at the fools trivializing rape.

Jesus H. Christ on a popsicle stick, let's hold back on the witch hunt, shall we? It's just a statement from a person that apparently also had employment issues. There has been no legal proceedings, or investigation into the matter, as far as I know. In this day and age, with accusations flying left and right, it's even more important than ever to await investigations and convictions before jumping to conclusions.

Even soundtracks...

Such fantastic horn parts in this cue ! (3:30)

II think it is the modern culture of 'subversion'. There positively absolutely has to be atleast some twist, otherwise the audience will feel it was too basic. We have become conditioned to expect something different, something offkilter. And modern marketing also plays into that. Straight old-fashioned good storytelling doesn't cut it any more these days.

Yes, hopefully that's what he means. Of course, there are examples of that type of music prior to KING KONG, post-JAZZ SINGER, even in the US, although far more marginal. I just get my "knickers in a twist" every time someone sorta says originally composed film music began with that film or that year. Those statements mostly come from Americans.

And this is a more complete version of The Last Jedi with all the blanks and microedits filled in by the OST (plus alternates and concert suites relegated to the end as bonuses, like a Matessino expansion). 2h47m in duration.

If you like violins arrangements, go for these two albums of Angèle Dubeau and La Pietà. No fireworks and not too much vibrato. Well, that's for you if you can hear the difference between a boldly hyper-virtuosic, ultra-inflected interpretation and a more subtile one.

I happened to see this photo from the Library of Congress, with a handwritten cover page (by Williams himself, it seems), showing the very first, 5-movement version of the Star Wars suite. Note the December 5, 1977 date:

For the SW and IJ scores with the money of Disney behind them, Mike would be able to do whatever he wants and not have to worry about the things he has to when making a product funding by a boutique label with limited budget. And also for these scores the same entity owns the film music and the mechanical rights so that issue doesn't exist either

Stunning images there. I wish I had a proper desktop version of this one, it's spectacular: