Marcus

How so? What about it bores you? Those intervals and their motion strike me as dull, uninspired and mechanical even. The kind of writing I might expect from the likes of lesser composers like Giacchino. Listening to it now, the only thing that gives me doubt are the running string ostinati under the melody, which is very Williams-esque. Huh... To my ears, it's a very elegantly constructed theme, with a sense of balance I don't often hear from living composers other than Williams. It's lyrical, poetic and immediate, but there's also something clever about it, something artificial (in the best sense); it feels like the work of a craftsman. It feels sculpted, and not the result of happenstance while noodling away at the keyboard. I think the simplicity is a matter of purposeful design (much like Luke's theme almost 40 years ago). There's also an emotional quality to it that feels refreshingly austere. It's a very solitary theme. Ruminative and desolate. I find it very interesting. It has me intrigued. It's not a broadly romantic theme, there's nothing lush or really otherworldly about it. Still, it's completely star wars-ian, and sits comfortably among the other themes in the glossary, while at the same time offering something we haven't quite heard before.

How so? What about it bores you?

I think the arrangement is entirely Williams, except for the slight swooshes and whatnot added on top for the trailer (as well as the drums/rhythmic impulses before the recap of the crescendo from the 2nd teaser). We can't know if it's in sequence, but to my ears, it plays like a concert arrangement, which has me thinking it's one of the central themes. I don't get the obsession with processing some of you seem to have? I think your ears are confused and confounded by the previous TV spots & trailer...

I reserve my waxing for music that actually warrants it. But when it does, be it (half) a theme or an entire opera, I'm unashamed to praise.

I think it's a beautiful theme. And, again, a theme with tremendous potential for development and variation. As is, it's a yearning, rather melancholy theme, and a close cousin of the more wistful renditions of the Force theme (it already shares tonality and certain textural traits with "Binary Sunset"). Can't wait to hear how it plays out within the context of the score. Easily the best theme since "The Book Thief".

Or at the very least a colleague with melodic chops.

And if it isn't, then many people around here are going to look like fools! Especially Marcus with that post: If this turns out not to be Williams music, this post will be comedy gold! I would be sincerely baffled if this new theme isn't penned by Williams. I just can't think of anyone else getting it so right with such simplicity. Maybe the simplicity throws some people off, but to me, the melodic construction, the rhythms, intervals and cadences, all seem genuine, and still surprising enough to not be pastiche work. There's something almost unlikely about it, perhaps its somewhat barren melodic profile, but it's precisely this unlikely quality that has me convinced (or fooled, should such be the case). That, and the fact that the theme is instantly memorable, seemingly related to the musical lore and lingo of Star Wars, and that it's a highly pliable theme, something you'd expect constructed by a master tunesmith.

The new theme is certainly catchy. And good. The first statement (flute w/oboe/clarinet doubling (typical Williams color), not synth) sounds like the second half of an initial statement. The bridging chords hint at The Imperial March/Dark Side, whereas the rest of the theme seems linked to the Force theme. I like the interallic inversion and slight rhythmic variation of the horns' entrance. Also like the low celesta intro (another Williams color).

Well, who is he addressing? Maybe he's just incompetent when it comes to writing program notes. There's just no reason to write such convoluted prose about such a piece. It doesn't say anything at all about the music. It neither reveals nor invites. To my eyes, it's just (pseudo) intellectual verbal posing, unworthy of a grown up professional. Only after being enlightened by the theory of the Curvature can one begin to fully understand and appreciate Davis' carefully articulated and positioned expressive markings! Reading that, I'm convinced ol Donny boy copied n pasted a page from the Contemporary Classical Composer's Bullshit Generator. At least I hope he did... It used to exist here, but it's recently been removed. Here's an example of the kind of thing it came up with. To suggest is a natural desire, but my current compositional activity seeks to superimpose all modules. It also perceives and dominates digitally-cognitive choreography-compositions. My work aims to abandon theoretically-aesthetic motifs with harmonically-almost-rhythmic mechanisms whilst sensing certain continuities or stylistic intervals. As a highly meta-professional composer, I explore the connection between textures and noises, and search for new ways to 'examine the passage'. My cluster is the only one of its kind, due in part to the inclusion of highly-ultra-bitonal challenge-sources, with a hint of so-called 'solo-expressions'. It has been said that those who integrate a musical continuity are unable to compose or oppose pitch-classes, at least not linearly, but I fundamentally disagree. In short, the platform must never sense the method. YES!

I think Davis' pretentious program note is sort of sad, given his stature. It just bespeaks a kind of insecurity that is completely unnecessary, or should be, at any rate, given that he's actually a pretty decent composer. It's uncomfortably close to being involuntarily parodic. Or perhaps he really is being facetious?

Lovely!

Did you attend Green's class? I was living in London at the time, but had taken Ed Green's film music course during the first year of my Master's three years earlier, and was invited to sub for him in a guest lecturing capacity for two weeks that April. I remember it being lots of fun, despite coming down with pneumonia about halfway through my stay...

Goodness gracious! I was guest lecturing for Edward Green's film scoring class.. This would have been April of '07...

Sounds like fun! Good luck, Thor! I did a guest lecture at The Manhattan School of Music back in 2007,partially with a similar theme, and remember discussing music from "Heartbeeps", "Missouri Breaks", "Not With My Wife, You Don't", and "Images". Part of my point,though (for a class consisting mostly of composers), was to look at shared technical aspects in Williams' writing, despite vast stylistic differences between the scores (I also did a brief history of the "Williams scherzo", from "Jane Eyre" via "Dracula" to "Scherzo for Motorcycle and Orchestra"). As you'll be addressing an audience of movie buffs, I think delving into scores such as "The Long Goodbye" and "Cinderella Liberty", or even more recent fare, like "Catch Me If You Can" and "Memoirs of a Geisha", would showcase the diversity of both musical styles and dramaturgical approaches quite well.

Final crescendo chord at 00.51 is (from bottom to top) C-A-C-Db-F-Bb, deciphering from smart phone speakers...

Sounds like the perfect John Williams celebratory piece for Tanglewood! I love these little "miniature concertos for orchestra" he seems to enjoy writing. It's such a fun way of approaching and presenting the orchestra, and a form Williams has cultivated to such a level of elegance and finesse. Hope to get to hear this soon!

Greetings! Not that I'm aware of. Although I know Saraste's expressed an interest in doing "Hate Songs" with Tora Augestad again, and Ekenes could be a likely place for such a reunion... Please do give my regards to the Finnish Chamber Orchestra,and to maestro Saraste; they performed absolutely marvelously last year!

Writing is writing. One might not like AotC. But it is still written with more sense of craft, more expertise, than just about anything else from the same period. I understand those who might feel otherwise, but to do so is to ignore the actual artistry of the work that went into it. Dismissing it is a matter of pure sentimentality. Whether one likes it or not. But that's fine, if one wants to insist on this being a popularity contest. Which I suppose it sort of is, anyway. For me as a composer, it's very clear and simple. AotC is a beautifully written score for an abominable film. There were plenty of other scores around the same time that might have resonated more with general audiences, thanks to being attached to better films. But the quality of the scoring remains.

It's absolutely stellar writing. Obviously. To pretend otherwise is delusional. The film itself, however, is unwatchable.

Whenever I hear something like McCreary's "The Cape", or the Sci-fi scores of Giacchino, Arnold etc, what I hear is a style of writing, not a quality of writing. To me, the style is entirely uninteresting, in as much as being completely without surprises. It's all stuff that's relatively easy to emulate, and unless I really connect with it emotionally, it just doesn't hold my attention. What makes Williams such a tough act to follow, is that unless your level of writing (not just the stylistics: brassy fanfares, mediant & tritone shifts, octatonic passage work etc) is truly sophisticated, you will end up sounding like a hack or an amateur by comparison. There's a level of artistry and elegance to Williams' work that transcends the mere clichés of the genre. These qualities and skills stem from a much deeper appreciation for compositional craft than mere stylistic emulation.

Well, if it's very close-miked, the dryness won't exactly help. Still, there's a sense of scale curiously absent from all of what I've heard of Giacchino's music. It has to do with cluttered unisons, low level of orchestral detail/activity, and non-resonant voicings.

It's not a matter of mixing, it's how the scores were written, and (actually to a lesser extent) orchestrated. There's an inherent "thinness" to much of Giacchino's writing in general. How one responds to it is of course a matter of taste & opinion.

That's very sweet of you! And it would have been a fun gig! But maybe one likelier to one day be offered my old MSM colleague, Joe Trapanese. I certainly know what I would have liked to make of it, though, should the job come my way...

Thank you! I'm so glad it worked, and more glad still that you liked it!

Oh, I'm sorry I'm not computer savvy enough to be of assistance. What I do know, is that the audio files were doubly uploaded, in both mp3 and ogg formats (not that I would know what either format entails), which was my web designer's attempt to avoid the exact problem you're having...