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My love for music has never been greater. I’ve never been more excited about writing and conducting and doing all the things I can do with what time I have to do it, how precious it all is. I’m a grateful man. What a great quote!

Really? I thought for an interview of its kind, this was unusually revealing, like with JW's discussion of the amount of redone music and him getting into the details of thematic transformation w/ Kylo Ren's motif. Particularly with the former, though JW says he loved it and was happy to create all these alternate cues, you can tell from the way he brings it up that it's not his preferred way of doing things. Here's a transcription of the discussion of Kylo Ren's transformed theme:

Interview now available on demand: https://media.kusc.org/audio/2020/01/20200131-Williams-Star-Wars.mp3?_=4 Sadly is just the interview and no music... I'm guessing the original broadcast featured excerpts from TROS?

I think I just heard JW say they recorded 226 minutes of music for TROS! And btw. there is something oddly satisfying about hearing TROS aired on the radio, with the words "Now playing: Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, music by John Williams". I never made the connection between Herrmann's tenure at the CBS and Williams' father working there. Nice to know A.D. 2020 that "old Williams" played under young Herrmann in the 1930s. Sheds a new light on how JW must have looked at his later friend and mentor with respect, having gotten to observe him first as a child. I had no idea their connection went that far into the past! Whenever Williams talks about Herrmann, I note these things down, because they are not to be found even in the latter's biography.

Wonderful interview! Love it. 226 minutes of music composed and conducted by the Maestro for the finale of the Star Wars Saga! That is amazing and a new record! Three hours and 46 minutes of music!!! I am praying that the Maestro and Mike Mattesino, who as we know is his personal music archivist, will work with Lucasfilm and release all nine scores expanded and remastered in the definitive treatment that Maestro John Williams' work deserves. Jeez, that would comprise three or four discs worth for Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker alone! Phenomenal.

So 226 minutes of music recorded in only 11 days. That's staggering! And this has to be Williams' longest film score of all time, correct? Amazingly it will still fit on 3CDs if Mike gets the chance to expand it properly. Can't imagine what hidden gems exist in the 100+ minutes of music we haven't heard a note of.

That's interesting! I guess he just scored the film wall to wall and wanted input into the volume of music in the final cut. And unsurprisingly, confirmation John scored the whole Death Star saber fight AND the infamous TIE flip sequence, but it was all lifted out: Holy hell, if Mike ever gets to work on the sequel trilogy the most interesting score will be saved until last. It's like there's a completely unreleased JW score locked in Disney's archives! On a side note, I've never heard of him attending a mixing session before! The closest thing that springs to mind is him checking with the sound team on Jurassic Park to hear their dinosaur vocalizations so he could ensure the music didn't clash with it (but that was before he even wrote the score).

Definitely not historical. Well, let me clarify because this is multilayered. We are hearing a romantic French version of what ancient Arabian music sounded like. That influenced the next generation of modal composers like Ravel, Vaughan Williams, Respighi ergo Miklos Rozso in his biblical epics ergo JW in the closest thing he did to a biblical epic, Raiders of the Lost Ark, when he needs to draw on that tradition quickly. So we are sort of hearing a romanticized French impressionistic version of this style that we associate with the period. Hollywood dumbs epochs of styles because they might use an element from 4,000 years ago plus french romanticism with something from contemporary islamic heritage (like a call to prayer) to immediately establish an expected sound world with primitive instrumentation (heavy percussion and emphasis on rhythms and archaic modes) and that is what you are hearing. My point is that you "hear" this as historically arabic because you are western and heard the western version of what traditionally arabian music sounds like. This is what the authentic stuff sounded like which if we heard it in a film would be authentic but wouldnt make us think of ancient arabia:

J.J. is a man who...makes a lot of changes *chuckle*

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Interview with Matthew Wood and David Acord. Music talk begins at 13:25. They said JW attended the final mix a few times, and every now and then would suggest they drop cues. https://soundworkscollection.com/post/star-wars-the-rise-of-skywalker-oscar-podcast-2020

World Premiere: City Light Symphony Orchestra. Thiago Tiberio, conductor KKL Luzern Concert Hall, Luzern, Switzerland December 4th and 5th, 2020 https://www.citylightconcerts.ch/event/dances-with-wolves-kkl-luzern/ Finally, John Barry is getting’ some L2P love.

Tonight at 9pm PST on Classical KUSC Radio, John Williams will be guest on the program KUSC at the Movies and will speak with host Jim Svejda about his Academy Award-nominated score for The Rise of Skywalker. The interview will be available online streaming afterwards. Here you can find the interviews with this year's other nominees: https://www.kusc.org/radio/programs/evening-program-movies-week-interviews-on-demand/ FYI, the interview was recorded a few days ago. KUSC's Brian Lauritzen posted a pic of JW with him and Jim Svejda on Twitter:

Wonderful interview. I can't wait for him to come back.

Well, time to do some math. According to the info we have, there's a little more than 120 minutes of music on the movie. Out of these, about 15 minutes are tracked from other Episodes. So, regardless of its usage, on TROS there is 105 - 110 minutes of music composed for TROS. Add this to the about 7 minutes 40 seconds of concert suites on the OST. So, this means that, for now, we have between 113 minutes and 118 minutes of music composed for TROS that we know. Of course, there's lots of differences between the OST and the film versions. I haven't done a more detailed analysys, but let's suppose the material on the OST that is not on the movie (Speeder Chase, the beginning of Battle of the Resistance) is about 5 to 10 minutes of music. To conclude, we have about 123 to 128 minutes of music that we know of, either from the movie or the OST. So, it leaves about 98 to 103 minutes of completly unheard music composed for this movie. Of course, I imagine that, on these 100 minutes, a lot of it is alternates, unused inserts, early versions, of course, but some of it could be interesting to hear, like the music for the beginning of the sunken Death Star duel. For TLJ, I imagine that, because of the iso, and considering JW recorded about 185 minutes, that there's less than 1h of completly unreleased material, probably to 35 to 40 minutes (still a lot, but comparatively less than the Abrams flicks, lol). On average, that's about 20m30s per day. Maybe they do about 10 minutes in the morning and 10 in the evening? In any case, this is impressive for an 87 year old man. It would be interesting to calculate the average minutes of music recorded per day for other movies, to see how this compares to his scores when he was younger.

https://assets.adg.org/media/submissions/2019-12-27_11-27-04/SW_ADG_PDF.pdf Production design "FYC" booklet. Some really interesting stuff in here!

I can understand why Williams removed the music in those two scenes. I hope to listen to those cues and maybe I'll love them as much as the music not used in Empire Strikes Back, but I can see why the sound effects and the silence works well there.

He said he absolutely loved Vienna, that it was a beautiful city and very picturesque with the snow. The whole experience was thrilling for him and he mentioned (twice) that he’d love to go back!

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Yes, it was very gratifying to hear JW asked and respond so thoughtfully about that musical detail! Wish he were asked those sorts of questions more often! Tallying the themes that are recapped in TROS depends a bit on what you define as a theme and what you count as a recurrence. But by my count, there's around ~17-18 previously established true themes brought back (noticeably lacking anything from the prequels or TLJ), plus the 5-6 new themes for TROS.

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All good points in general, but I'm not really seeing the connection to this passage in particular. The Ark theme doesn't use the sort of harmonic language and instrumentation that you normally get with the type of music you're talking about. If anything, it's always struck me as a uniquely Western musical in-joke, using the so-called "devil's interval" to represent the Judeo-Christian God. For what you're talking about, I'd look more at the music for the arrival in Cairo or for the swordsman in the marketplace. @First TROS March Accolyte, you're not imagining the similarity between these. It's a B minor chord - just below the C minor chord heard in "The Map Room: Dawn" - and it's voiced very similarly. I'm guessing it's unintentional, born of Williams' familiarity with a wide range of orchestral works and there only being so many notes and so many instruments to work with.

You know the drill! ...and then he said; I know, but all the good composers are dead!

I KNEW IT! I had a feeling that the Maestro had originally scored that sequence of Rey in the desert on Pasaana with Kylo Ren's modified TIE whisper coming at her, as well as the ENTIRE lightsaber duel between Rey and Kylo on the wreakage of the Death Star II. Sweet!

Post-BREXIT sugar rush I assume. It will fade once Richard realises he's still just living in fucking Scotland.

Second episode was good, or at least still intriguing. It’s been 2 hours of set up so far. I miss episodic TV. I’d love a Trek formatted slightly more like Doctor Who. Each episode a completely distinct story but with season-long character arcs.

True! I get a bit put off by that modern "blog post" look.

I actually kind of like film music review sites having a retro look. For instance I kind of prefer the look of the old Movie-Wave, to its current incarnation. Maybe it's just because that's how these sites were when I grew up reading them, and I am averse to change. Though I do confess that Filmtracks is a tad tough on the eyes at times...

Yes! It's nice to hear him speak about his love of modal transposition and reharmonization, now I hear his voice when I see the variations in the catalog With another 100+(!) minutes of score confirmed recorded we may find something from the prequels or TLJ. I'd love to hear his thoughts on Duel of the Fates, Battle of the Heroes or Anakin.

I can answer here. I adore this score and it was one of the first ones that I obsessed over in wanting all the film versions. Honestly, most of it does match the film pretty decently. It's a usual sort of approach. Some cues are edited together, some have micro-edits and remove more sparse, experimental, or "redundant" bits in the film. There are a couple that are completely different, but not many. Mostly we're just missing stuff. Let's see off the top of my head (and referencing some notes) and this is not everything, obviously I'm not including the Pit Orchestra cues and all the tracking of Loverly Spring, but you get the picture... 23 Loverly Spring The OST version is missing several inserts/overlays from the version that appear at the top of the film. There's extra vocals at the very beginning and some harp flourishes added. 01 The Bad Beginning Has a much shorter version of "Loverly Spring" on the front of it on the OST, but otherwise it's basically the film version give or take some edits 03 The Baudelaire Orphans Full recorded version, it's edited down in the film. XX Justice Strauss Appears to be tracked from "Resilience" 02 Chez Olaf This one is where the major differences start happening. Everything on the OST was in the film, but the OST has some of the more experimental bits edited out. It's just edited down for a better listening experience. 04 In Loco Parentis Full recorded version, edited down in the film. XX Chores Seems to be a shorter version of Puttanesca with a different ending. 09 Puttanesca OST is edited, it's the film version, but it's missing a section. 05 Resilience Pretty much the film version, it might be edited in the movie, but I don't recall. Same recording though. 07 An Unpleasant Incident Involving A Train The first 40 or so seconds of this are in the film, but the rest of the cue was dropped in favor of tracked music from 4M8 Hurricane Herman and Attack of the Hook Handed Man, plus an original insert recorded to better incorporate the tracked material called "Train Tag". This is easily the biggest editing mess of the whole film. XX Take Them Mr. Poe This cue doesn't appear at all on the OST, but is a simple combo of the opening of "Bad Beginning" and a new version of "Lachrymose Ferry" or a new recording / edit of a section from "4M8 Hurricane Herman" 06 The Reptile Room Full recorded version, it's edited down in the film. XX Sanctuary Not on the OST, not surprised it wasn't, it's a short, more ambient underscore version of Resilience. XX Meet Stephano A new version of Olaf's theme, entirely missing from the OST, it's not super different from Chez Olaf, but it's definitely a different recording and a new cue altogether with many different elements. 19 Snaky Message Pretty sure this one equals exactly what is in the film. 10 Curious Feeling Of Falling Full recorded version, it's edited down in the film. 11 Regarding The Incredibly Deadly Viper I'll explain this later, but this is where things start getting curious. This cue is a combo of a cue from the end of the film "Olaf Scheme Pt2." and the cue the track was named for "Regarding The Incredibly Deadly Viper". Basically the first two minutes are "Olaf Scheme" and then it switches to "Regarding The Incredibly Deadly Viper". The portion dropped from the OST is basically the same, but much sparser, which explains why they combined the cues here. 13 Lachrymose Ferry This cue matches more of what appears in "Take Them Mr. Poe" listed above, just missing an overlay and a different ending, but it's possible it was re-written for that scene. Regardless, the OST version seems to be what was fully recorded. The film, however, uses a more ambient version of this cue. 14 Concerning Aunt Josephine The OST includes a much bigger intro for this cue. The film version nixes this and just starts about 9 seconds in. The film also drops everything after 1:23 or so. I'd imagine this was a combination of different cues. Two of which were unused? Not sure. 15 VFD Full recorded version, it's edited down in the film. 16 The Wide Window Full recorded version and matches the film. XX Ike's Room This cue is technically on the OST. It's pulled from underlying elements of "Wide Window" starting at around 0:53 and is more ambient in nature. XX Captain Sham Completely new version of the set piece / victory theme featuring a fiddle starting with a short comedic bit. Lovely little cue. Not on the OST. XX White Face Women Just an edit of 5M4 Verisimilitude from the OST. Literally just the first 6 seconds. 17 Cold As Ike Like "Concerning Aunt Josephine", the OST features an unused cue for the opening. A big brass growl. I assume it was meant to underscore the reveal of the house or perhaps the broken window. The rest of the cue matches what's in the film. The film might have some edits. 18 4M8 Hurricane Herman Full recorded version and matches the film. 08 Curdled Cave Full recorded version, it's edited down in the film. 20 The Regrettable Episode Of The Leeches Full recorded version, it's edited down quite a bit in the film. 21 Interlude With Sailboat Completely unused in the film. Seems like it would've scored a more extended sequence involving the two boats. The scene is unscored in the film, but it's basically another version of "Concerning Aunt Josephine". Personally, I'd have rathered this cue get dropped and include the "Captain Sham" cue, but what do I know. XX Jo's Demise This cue is actually a sparser version of 4:09-4:44 or so from the otherwise unused OST version of "An Unpleasant Incident Involving A Train". It removes all the train elements and leaves just the strings and flute. So...it's kind of on the OST? XX Our New Play Technically, all the elements of this cue are on the OST. It's kind of an edit of "Chez Olaf", but has isolated elements. Super short. 12 The Marvelous Marriage Full recorded version, it's edited down in the film. 22 5M4 Verisimilitude Full recorded version, it's edited down slightly in the film. XX Olaf Scheme Pt 2 This mostly matches the OST track "Regarding The Incredibly Deadly Viper", but as discussed early, the ending was dropped and combined with that earlier cue. The film has a crescendo ending that goes into some of the Pit Orchestra source cues. XX What Would Violet Do? Not on the OST. Great little reprise of "Cold As Ike", but has more energy and movement. Short, but definitely one to be missed. 24 A Woeful Wedding Full recorded version and matches the film. 25 Attack Of The Hook-Handed Man Full recorded version and matches the film. 26 Taken By Supreeze The OST track is a combo of two cues: "Taken By Supreeze Pt 1 & 2". Technically, both parts appear in the film, but Part 2 (1:21-End) was to score a Deleted Ending. The very end of Part 2 is tracked onto Part 1 to give it a bigger ending. 27 One Last Look Full recorded version and matches the film. 28 The Letter That Never Came Full recorded version and matches the film. 29 Drive Away (End Title) Full recorded version and matches the film. So, the OST is made up of material recorded for the film and typically matches quite well. There's definitely some differences in some places though. My theory for how this score ended up working from a production stand point is that I think some of the repeating material was recorded once or twice and reused as elements in other cues that either weren't scored initially or they had planned to be tracked from the beginning. The film consistently drops elements from recordings and uses sparser versions, see "Regarding The Incredibly Deadly Viper", "Lachrymose Ferry", "Ike's Room", "Jo's Demise", "Our New Play", etc. I wouldn't be surprised if many things were recorded as samples or elements and then looped or reused in the final cues. This matches what they state in the documentary on the DVD and as well as what I was told when I spoke to Steve Kujala. Newman liked to record with small groups of instruments sometimes and it was all very experimental. Director's were generally discouraged from attending those, I assume, because they were recording elements and fragments of things to use later with the full orchestra. Here's what Steve had to say about Newman and a bit about Snicket: Overall, the differences from the OST to the film don't sound drastic enough to warrant an expansion. I wish there could be. I'd like to hear clean versions of the other versions and extra cues. Plus there's plenty of alternates and inserts and quite a few source cues. Oh well. We'll just have to appreciate the OST and anything that can be pulled from the film.

Morricone's Oscar for The Hateful Eight/The Thing is questionable. The Academy changes the rules of the game every year. Morricone didn't deserve it.

Wasn't T3 "woke", before "woke" was even thought of? Mrs. Kensington is

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JW: It's very nice to finally shake hands with you, Mr. Morricone. Now who's that lovely old gentleman sitting over there?

I honestly don't get all the praise for Hildur's JOKER... Also, regarding his TROS comments, do these people not get that directors these days (cough JJ cough) are not tending to give Williams room for his music to breathe or "pop"? Spielberg lets Williams have his moments; JJ on the other hand suffocates Williams' music. For instance, the glorious choral finale of "Farewell" could have been an all-time great JW moment for a Spielberg film; in a JJ movie it's practically an afterthought.

Bring on the Scherzo for Droids and Orchestra! Bomp BAAAAAAAH bah doddle omp, doddle omp, BAAAAAAH! If I were ever to change my JWFan handle, it would be to Droid Motif Acolyte. But aside from that, I think "Into the Trap" would make an awesome concert suite with the addition of a nice B section.

Dave (1993) Fun little movie, The Prince and The Pauper meets Mr. Smith Goes To Washington. Feels so quaint and unrealistic in these dark and disturbed times. But, it is a winning, well-written movie, a political fantasy that invites you along for the ride and makes it worthwhile. Nice James Newton Howard score. Oh, and Oliver Stone parodies himself in a cameo and is dead serious about it. 3/4

This is very minor compared to the Pops’ recording of Parade of the Ewoks, where the timpanist gets ahead by many bars (probably accidentally skipped over a line in the part) and is loudly playing in the wrong key for quite a while!

I appreciate your feedback! Interesting about the silent film comment because JW's Potter scores have always reminded us of Star Wars in that they could practically be from silent films. I get what you mean about the Dark Mark though. We extended that cue at the end when editing to transition out, and that could have worked at the beginning too. We basically felt it needed that tension and mystery between these quickly-paced scenes. That way it could kind of come at you out of nowhere like the big choral moment in Writing on the Wall (even though that does have other material before it) BP

We‘ve all made our OST+FYC combos, and would love to have the FYC parts in higher quality and a lossless format.

Marketing for Dark Fate definitely screwed up. It seemed woke AF. But upon watching the movie I thought it was alright, no PC agenda at all being forced down my throat - just a good, over the top action flick. I don’t really understand all the bad reviews either. Sure it’s not great, and it underperformed at the box office, but it was entertaining, fun and kept my interest throughout the movie - which is more than I can say for 90 % of all movies I’ve watched the last couple of years.

I don´t agree. The best performance is priority always.

Wow I can't believe that physical copy came and went and nobody on JWFan noticed. Shame on all of us! Here's the pics so at least we have a permanent archive of what it looked like it case no more ever turn up

For all the shit that's heaped upon this trilogy, I absolutely love the main cast. In all the interviews they do, post on social media etc. they seem like great friends and genuinely good people.

Not exactly SW-related but this video with John Boyega choked me up. What a beautiful son!

Ludwig told me last week about this topic which I missed, and at the time my reaction was to call it the "fate" tag. Tragic works too, less overtly Wagnerian. Perhaps "destiny," and here's another instance of it in the Destiny track... exposed on solo clarinet with an extra neighbour note - 5-(4)-6-2 - right after (yet another) gentle Sith/Neapolitan variation of the Force. I also suggested to Ludwig that the major mediant incarnation of this with Ben Solo's death matches earlier instances in Galaxy's Edge... ... and TPM (same key as GE), where I first became aware of it as an entity, and where it enters as if out of nowhere, as we prepare to meet Anakin for the first time. In yet another variation in the same cue the tag is transposed up: 1-b2-5

Perhaps you should consider putting this is your signature field - it would save you a lot of typing!

They’re doing a deluxe slipcased edition of the two books. 3,000 copies. The Hobbit Sketchbook will be signed by Lee.

Well, I would say Williams, however since he isn't up there I put Herbert Spencer, because in the early days he taught Williams a lot of what he uses nowadays. Pope and Neufeld don't add much of anything but pretty much follow his orders.