Omen II

I went to this at the Royal Albert Hall this evening.
 
It was absolutely f**king brilliant.

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As you might remember a few years ago I released several French Horn Medleys of JW cues.
Back then my audio mixing and video editing skills were quite limited, and listening back to the whole thing I felt it would definitely benefit from a little "update" !
So I am now in the process of remixing and remastering the entire Tribute ( that is 5 parts, totalling 1 hour of music )
I will be doing a brand new video for each part, which will feature a brand new audio mix, all of the corresponding movie scenes and sheet music synchronized to the piece
 
Part 1
 
Part 2
 
Part 3
 
Part 4
 
Part 5  
 
     

RSNO performs Scherzo for X-Wings (rehearsal):

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/whats-on/music-nightlife-news/rsno-follow-up-incredible-star-7471650#Zy8J7HVRmPeuUTMK.99

I liked this photo (taken by LSO percussionist and JWO regular David Jackson) of my two favourite musical JWs meeting backstage at the John Wilson Orchestra's recent concert at Royce Hall in Los Angeles. I knew that John Wilson was a big fan of John Williams and it seems as though the admiration is mutual. Larry King photo bombs too, which is nice.

Any chance that the John Wilson Orchestra will do an all-Williams concert at the BBC Proms next time? I saw them again at the Royal Festival Hall this week and they were brilliant as ever.

 

They thought he was black, because he calls everyone "baby"!

Here is a transcript of the discussion between Williams and Morricone:   Morricone: "You know, we're sitting here you and I like a couple of regular fellas.  You do what you do, and I do what I gotta do.  Now that we've been face to face if I'm there and I gotta put you away I won't like it.  But, I tell you, if it's between you and some poor bastard whose wife you're gonna turn into the wife of an Oscar loser...brother...you are going down."   Williams: "There's a flip side to that coin.  What if you do got me boxed in and I gotta put you down?  Because no matter what...you won't get in my way.  We've been face to face, yeah.  But I will not hesitate.  Not for a second."   Apparently it was all very pleasant and cordial.

Here is a transcript of the discussion between Williams and Morricone:   Morricone: "You know, we're sitting here you and I like a couple of regular fellas.  You do what you do, and I do what I gotta do.  Now that we've been face to face if I'm there and I gotta put you away I won't like it.  But, I tell you, if it's between you and some poor bastard whose wife you're gonna turn into the wife of an Oscar loser...brother...you are going down."   Williams: "There's a flip side to that coin.  What if you do got me boxed in and I gotta put you down?  Because no matter what...you won't get in my way.  We've been face to face, yeah.  But I will not hesitate.  Not for a second."   Apparently it was all very pleasant and cordial.

Jon Broxton posted a bunch of photos from the event. Another good one of the two maestros:

Johnny!!

Ennio Morricone was presented with his BAFTA for his score for The Hateful Eight on stage at the O2 Arena in London at yesterday's concert, which was nice.  He had not attended the ceremony because he was conducting a concert in Dublin on Sunday night.

This past December, I had the fun opportunity of seeing Home Alone live in concert at Abravanel Hall in Salt Lake City, UT.
 
http://www.utahsymphony.org/15-16-season/1112-home-alone-feature-film-with-the-utah-symphony
 
I gotta tell you: losing my aural virginity to a John Williams score live in concert was something else. It is definitely magnitudes better hearing it live than on a soundtrack.
 
I got chills just listening to the 20th Century Fox theme. And from there, it was a roller coaster ride of emotions swirling around a Christmas tale of a kid outsmarting a pair of otherwise wonderful actors. And I kept the program as a souvenir.
 
My only regrets?
1) I couldn't take any pictures or video recording during the show. Looking back, though, it was the better decision to make seeing how getting kicked out during my first ever John Williams concert would've ruined it for myself.
2) I couldn't get a peek at the full score on the conductor's stand. If I did, I could've gotten the cue list for Home Alone.
 

 
Fantastic!  Thank you, Mari.  The video of a complete run through of Rey's Theme in rehearsal is an unexpected bonus.
 
I love it when the Scots use the word 'outwith'.  Does anywhere else in the English-speaking world use that word?

 
I would imagine so.  You can see the leader of the first violins working out the bowing at the end of the clip and marking her part during the piece.  Also the rehearsal clip is filmed in Glasgow Royal Concert Hall rather than Usher Hall in Edinburgh, suggesting that it was an early read through rather than a final dress rehearsal.  It's still great to see it performed all the way through by a top class orchestra.

 
I would imagine so.  You can see the leader of the first violins working out the bowing at the end of the clip and marking her part during the piece.  Also the rehearsal clip is filmed in Glasgow Royal Concert Hall rather than Usher Hall in Edinburgh, suggesting that it was an early read through rather than a final dress rehearsal.  It's still great to see it performed all the way through by a top class orchestra.

 
 

Here's an article about the concerts from earlier today (including a preview video of the RSNO rehearsing Rey's Theme):
 
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/whats-on/music-nightlife-news/watch-royal-scottish-national-orchestra-7315153#chd9Oc1cPUtYs066.97
 
 

The BSO's latest promo picture is the stuff of nightmares.  Yoda in a Primark dressing gown with giant hairy hands!
 

 
OMG, I just found this on YouTube…don't think it's been mentioned before. If you ever wanted to hear this trailer performed by an actual orchestra, choir and church organ (!), well, this Liverpool girls secondary school delivers. Kids these days. 
 
 

Last Thursday I went to a lovely concert of Debbie Wiseman's film and TV music at Milton Court given by the Guildhall Chamber Orchestra, with the composer conducting.  The orchestra consisted entirely of music students from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and I can honestly say that a blind man would have thought he was listening to a professional orchestra.  The young musicians in the orchestra are so talented, it made me feel quite ashamed of my scratchings on the violin.
 
The highlights included a four-movement suite from Arsene Lupin, Wilde, Haunted as well as suites from TV programmes such as Father Brown (one of my mum's favourites!) and Wolf Hall.  In the latter the orchestra's cor anglais player Sian Robinson came to the front of the orchestra to play the solo with great aplomb that belied her age.  It was my first visit to the new Milton Court, part of the Barbican complex attached to the Guildhall School - a visit is highly recommended if you are in London and you get the chance.
 
Here are a couple of pictures of the rehearsal pilfered from the Guildhall's Facebook page:
 

 

The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra will be performing an interesting looking programme of music from space films at a number of venues in the south of England in February and March.  I thought this was worthy of a new thread as it is a very good orchestra and there is a lot of John Williams music scheduled, including some stuff that does not get programmed very often such as War of the Worlds and the theme from Lost In Space (which season I cannot tell you).
 
Heroes & Aliens
 
There will be concerts in Exeter, Poole, Portsmouth, Brighton and Bristol.  Pete Harrison, who knows his way around a John Williams score, conducts.
 

 
J Williams Star Wars - Main Title, Horner Apollo 13, Goldsmith Star Trek: Nemesis - End Titles, J Williams E.T Suite, Giacchino Star Trek XI - Hella Bar Talk/Enterprising Young Men, Giacchino Star Trek into the Darkness: London Calling, Rabin Armageddon, J Williams Across the Stars (Love Theme from Star Wars Attack of the Clones), 

J Williams Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Horner Avatar - War, Goldsmith Alien, Horner Aliens, Phillips Battlestar Galactica, Grainer/Gold Dr Who Theme, J Williams War of the Worlds, J Williams Lost in Space, J Williams Superman

Alrighty, here's my report from my concert attending last week.
 
I went to Lucerne together with two dear friends last Tuesday (December 29) to attend the film concert setting of Raiders of the Lost Ark, performed by 21st Century Symphony Orchestra conducted by Maestro Ludwig Wicki. I had very high expectations about it because I was aware about how good these people are, yet the experience was even much more exciting, thrilling and exhilarating than I could possibly imagine. First of all, the performance was absolutely flawless--both the orchestra and conductor really seem to be born to play this score, there were not a wrong note all throughout, nor a failed sync with the images. And they played everything without any click-track (the conductor had only a small screen on the side of the podium with the film running with streamers and punches). Despite the difficulty of performing everything so precisely and close attention, the orchestra never seemed too cold or just too technical, but everything was performed with flair and proper musicality (many of the players had grin on their faces from start to finish). Conductor Wicki really understands how Williams' music should be performed and his conducting was flawless and vibrant, thanks also to the spectacular acoustics of KKL concert hall, truly one of the most beautiful concert halls of the world. Really, it's hard to choose highlights because it was a shiver of excitement from beginning to end. The big set-pieces (the prologue, "The Basket Game", "The Map Room," "Desert Chase" and "Miracle of the Ark") were obviously the moments where the chills and thrills were stronger, but literally everything was done with such fluidity that the whole audience was in awe. Even the synth choir was balanced very well. The mix of dialogues and sound effects was sometimes covered by the monstrous volume of the orchestra (especially in the action sequences), but personally this wasn't a problem AT ALL because it is always the other way round and for once the music was able to be absolute queen of the night. In fact, watching the movie in this unique way made you realize more strongly than ever how big and important is the role of the orchestra in this film, which becomes a real character of equal importance to those we see on the screen. The film is an all-time masterpiece of rhythm and editing, which allowed Williams to write a real ballet-like score, where everything moves along at Swiss clock precision (pardon the pun!) and everything pays off. There's a lot of Max Steiner-inspired mickeymousing all throughout which underlines both the tiniest detail (think about Marion puffing the cigarette smoke in Toht's face) and the biggest event, but the tone never seems too heavy or ponderous. Quite the contrary, it has the lighthearted feel of a great fun ballet score.
 
On a more nerd side, the performed score retained all the film edits (which luckily are only a very few and all tastefully done), however the short piece of music where the Ark crate burns from inside on the cargo (right after Marion's Theme) was properly restored. Also, it was nice to have all the original manuscript cue titles retained on the concert program, which also included a short nice note from JW himself.
 
Last but not least, it was thrilling to see the film together with an audience in a packed auditorium, all laughing and cheering in perfect sync. Raiders is a masterpiece in the history of both film and film music, one of my five all-time favorite movies ever and surely one of the highest peaks ever reached in the career of both Steven Spielberg and John Williams. What more I can say? If you have the opportunity to attend a performance, don't hesitate and go see it in this unique format. I'm sure that you will be as excited as myself.

This is a performance of part of the score from E.T. The Extraterrestrial, music by John Williams. This is the Escape/Chase/Saying Goodbye section. I created the piano reduction, trying to get as many notes in as possible. It is not a perfect performance, and in some cases I give up accuracy for intensity. I'm playing a Korg N1.

A little about me: I've been a piano player and composer all of my life, having studied at the Eastman School of Music and Chapman University. About a year ago I broke my left arm in a mountain biking accident. I have two metal plates in my arm and am amazed at how well it has healed and how natural it feels. I decided I had better make some recordings before I do something bad to the other arm, or hand for that matter. 
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ID7oLclh2s

Thank you for listening! 
http://www.jeffalu.com

He's not exactly a celebrity, but I was not sure where else to put this; former LSO managing director and cellist Clive Gillinson talks about playing cello on the original Star Wars score:
 
http://www.carnegiehall.org/BlogPost.aspx?id=4295019067&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=starwars&sourceCode=22359
 
 
 

 
I'm sure it was a deliberate homage. The shot is even set up in the same was as the title sequence to the Granada series, I think.