WilliamsStarShip2282

What I've noticed with aging composer/ musicians is that you won't know until you know. First thing is, maybe the "trusted source"is correct, but maybe it's just his thought and he made it up in his mind because he wants to be important and seems like he's buddy buddy with him. I find that more often than not, "trusted sources"are often wrong. Especially when you don't list who they are. First, it's an opinion (since only Williams will make his own decisions, which makes most of the things on this feed seem silly), and therefor, why would it be top secret? Unless his name is Michael Cohen....
 
Also, so many older artists cancel things at the last second. Probably because they're old, obviously, and are not always sure if they can or can't do something until the time comes. In the last few years of his life, Andre Previn was scheduled to attend and even conduct performances, and his participation/ presence was canceled at the last second. Same with Williams , more or less, for the European concerts and also at Tanglewood that year when he had the pace maker put in.
 
Also this google thread from a miiiiiiillion years ago made me giggle, as it's the exact same argument.
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.arts.sf.starwars/3DTy6lCkWGk

I wish this thread had plans to retire.  

I've just had quite enough of this Obi-John Willobi jibberish.

I've never seen the Pops mentioned in any list of the world's greatest orchestras.
 
 It's like the economy version of BSO.

Anybody who dislikes America, the Dream Goes on? I find it catchy, apart from the vomit-inducing lyrics.

It's a very enjoyable piece.  His new cello concerto premieres in LA later this month - hopefully a recording will follow!
https://www.laco.org/events/kahane-on-mozart/

Kaska was a student at Berklee in Boston when Williams was still music director of the Pops. It was some kind of effort to commission young talent, and ( I believe there is indeed someplace online where you can read all about this, maybe his website), he was chosen by the family concert conductor and shown to Williams who gave the OK to commission him, the result being a harp concerto for Ann Hobson Pilot.
 
The concerto itself is awful, cheap sounding, poorly orchestrated, and what makes it so cheap is that you can hear where he actually copy and pasted lines from not one or two composer, but a lot (mostly Salzedo, Copland and Williams), and generally speaking it's a boring piece.

Found this on instagram, looks like Across the Stars was arranged for her. This is especially interesting since the Yo-Yo Schindler's list one was more of a transcription probably.

Would be great if the JWFan social media team could stop posting photos of him as part of a “year in review”, I keep doing a double take and thinking he’s died!

You guys are all pretty negative

You guys are all pretty negative

Sounds like a bunch of hype to me. I don't see why he would stop, unless like someone else said, he has more serious health issues (I really hope not). However, he did have to cancel London and Vienna, and he is scheduled on the Tanglewood on Parade concert as a conductor, HOWEVER he is only listed as "host"for film night, with David Newman conducting the entire concert. I guess the regular spring Pops season will tell us more, but I'm hoping it's just a schedule conflict as has happened in the past with his recording dates (or when he has the pace maker recovery). Hope it's only a scheduling thing,....

Found this on instagram, looks like Across the Stars was arranged for her. This is especially interesting since the Yo-Yo Schindler's list one was more of a transcription probably.

I think they only released his 2004 arrangement for band, that was first performed when he was the Rose Bowl Grand Marshall.

Probably all of the major ones, to one degree or another.

Will he be auto erotic??
 

 
And will the animatronic be programmed to give autographs?

All art must be quantified!

And Lorin Maazel, Roger Norrington and Holst himself. 
Sorry your shit didn't work. 
And. This list must be The Truth.
 

---sorry auto correct. It's not that I have anything against him, it's just my experience in listening.
His recording of Schonberg's Gurre-lieder is absolutely hideous, by far the worst (although there are several bad recordings by famous conductors) but it's pretty unpleasant. Also his recording of Le Sacre with the London Symphony has some issue. (His recording of Gruppen is excellent but thats with three conductors and really contemporary, I don't know if thats a good example)
 
Actually, one of my good friends is a a huge fan of Karajan. So many conductors said he was the greatest, but a lot of his recordings are not so great as well, like both the Rite of Spring recordings are really weird, and his Debussy and Ravel are off. But of course there are a great many that are pure gold.
 
Also which was not mentioned is that just because a conductor does some genres better than others (I consider different periods of music almost like different genres) does not make them a bad conductor. The difference between Debussy and Bach is enormous, and Mozart is very different to perform than Brahms (although there are many bad conductors that perform everything the same way, which is boring as hell). So to respond to publicist, to call someone a "pops" conductor is a huge compliment to be able to handle a bunch of random repertoire all in one evening with minimal rehearsal (since a lot of orchestras just use these concert to make a quick buck). Additionally, I remember a quote from Seiji Ozawa saying he could never conduct to a film like Williams does, it was too difficult for him.
 
I think the same can be said about Arthur Feidler, who did endless concerts outside the Boston Pops, and they were mostly of the classical repertoire, and he was labeled "kind of pops"or something like that. Don't forget also all these people are trained at conservatories just as "the greats"but are not necessarily repeating or playing the same music over again (like the Mahler symphonies for example, I think conductors were considered incompetent for a while if they didn't record the whole Mahler cycle). I think Alexandre Desplat is probably the best example of this (although he doesn't really concertize outside his own music). He graduated as a flute major from the conservatoire Nationale de Lyon, which has extremely high standards, especially in composition. Now his music is very simple, but by choice and style. If you ask him to write a fugue in the style of Bach, I can guarantee he can do it because he would have had to in order to graduate, and additionally I believe he performed "Explosante-Fixe"by Pierre Boulez, which is for three flutes and is extremely difficult contemporary music. So just because they do not perform Mahler or Wagner, does not mean they could not.
 
PS- In all honest reality, without any bias, musicians who claim to work on things for decades either exaggerate wildly or they are honestly not the brightest person around. I know it's pretty difficult for classical people to understand because it's very high-brow and elitist, but there are a great many classical artists who are dumb as rocks, and I can tell you from experience. Certainly not all of them, but I've noticed that sometimes they take forever to learn a score because they're just not too swift (or from their training also, which lacked any sort of training in analysis). Also they are people who fundamental perform and put on a show, and they love to exaggerate and dress things up. I love Andre Previn and he's pretty intelligent for sure and a very find musician, but sometimes he repeated stories in interviews and every time the story is very different from the other versions, but always dramatized sounding. Also, does " I studied it on the airplane before arriving for the first rehearsal" sound particularly attractive? More often than not that's what conductors do when they've performed the piece a lot or it's something that does require special attention
 
ALSO for example John Williams has written some rock tunes, funk and a lot of jazz (and performed a lot of jazz too) as well as Haydn and some other piano concerti at Tanglewood. He can swing and groove just as well as play classical. HOWEVER most classical trained people cannot do anything besides make modest interpretations, but for most part play the music very literally. See here, Anne-Sophie tries to play some kind of Tango and it's all over the place.
 
 
 
 

Most people who don't think he's a good conductor are ignorant and would never know the difference in their life. For every good conductor, there's a great many more who are posers. A good conductor, in whatever way, get's the orchestra to play well, corrects mistakes, balances, and adds their interpretation to the music (which is always the hardest part as orchestras sometimes fight the conductor).
 
John Williams is an excellent conductor, with a meticulous ear for just about everything, especially for knowing what to attack in a rehearsal when and how and even perhaps more important when to leave things alone (such as James Levine who would pick over the same details forever or tediously rehearse the last three mozart symphonies, stopping and starting constantly and never really playing through any of it 100%, which really just accomplishes nothing more than irritate the orchestra). 
 
A great many conductors live on this mythic reputation, which when asked for evidence to support such a reputation, there's usually nill to go on. Especially true in the case of his recordings of "The Rite of Spring"which Stravinsky absolutely hated and said it was the antithesis of what he envisioned (If you don't believe me, mainly because it's widely reported Stravinsky loved the recording, just look up his autobiography he goes off on a big rant about it. Ligeti, Boulez and Stockhausen were also displeased with his recordings of their pieces saying he ignored their wishes and did whatever he wanted). Bernstein was a legend but he could be all over the place, inconsistent. Claudio Abaddo has more hideous recordings ( meaning just terrible sounding and full of mistakes) than any other conductor, Andris Nelsons I think is also difficult to follow as it seems he conducts some pieces differently from each rehearsal to concert (from what I have observed, I could be wrong) although his interpretations can be pretty nice, Leonard Slatkin (also in my opinion) was never anything special and has in the last ten years gotten so lazy and uninspired that that kind of sound is 100% reflected in the orchestra (having heard him conduct several orchestras within the same few years in the US and Europe), Gergiev's performances always sound terrible because he's extremely spontaneous and doesn't even rehearse the orchestras most of the time he has other people do it. Daniel Barenboim mostly screams at the orchestra (usually calling them stupid), throws things, and in any case every time i've heard him conduct live and even on many recordings it sounds very half assed and sloppy and comes across as very lazy (although the times I've heard him perform as a pianist have been wonderful). Copland, Stravinsky, and Pendereki were (are) absolutely terrible conductors.
 
I could keep going but that's really boring. Basically what makes a good conductor, at least one who is respected by all, is a person who's a good go between who acts like they are one of the ensemble, respects their wishes, but also can be commanding when needed. Deals with balancing, mistakes, and gives their interpretation when they can, or at the very least, what they believe the composers wishes were. Most importantly are excellent communicators. I think a lot of names are usually left out; Simon Rattle, Pierre Boulez, Bernard Haitink, Andre Previn, John Elliot Gardiner and John Williams certainly fall into a category of the finest conductors who embody all the above, but could conduct various types of music well ranging from the avante-garde to the contemporary.
 
PS- judging a conductor who only conducts classics is silly because for example, the last three mozart symponies, the orchestra will usually play them the way they usually play them and will sometimes completely ignore the conductor, which I have seen time and again, however a great recording of the vienna phil, all teh credit goes to the conductor who may have little to do with the performance besides stand there and look nice.
 

On some classical web sites it’s among the recommended versions.

Isn't his version of The Planets average at best?
 
Great conductors don't because laureates at the Boston Pops.

Strictly, as a "conductor", not conducting his own compositions, these two albums are I think, among his best ones:


 

I think we have whole threads devoted to the topic of getting good results out of sample libraries including Vienna.  Some of us are quite accomplished and I would advise you to investigate those threads because the bottom line is sample libraries are instruments and you need to practice and work with them to get good results.  You can buy the best library and get poor results if you don't know how to use them most effectively similarly you can have mediocre libraries and get excellent results if you have great mockup skills...and have sufficient hardware to use them properly.  It's a broad topic and has been discussed frequently here.