The Psycho Pianist

Went to this last night. Was a great concert, the Hallé were in great form - particularly the trumpets who were on point all evening. Highlight for me was "Dartmoor 1912" being played beautifully by the principal flautist, as well as the rare JFK making an appearance, again with perfect trumpet performance on the solo. Jurassic Park was for me played much better last night than under JW's command when I last heard it at the Hollywood Bowl last year. Played at the proper, original tempo. Anyway, the lineup was eventually as follows:

I reckon Princess Leia's theme takes some inspiration at least from Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto op. 35 in D Major. First movement. Around 2 minutes in.

Forgot to post this, my video of the last couple of minutes of the film plus the first minute or so of the flying theme credits.

http://www.filmmusicsociety.org/news_events/features/2015/090815.html I thought that ending sounded new. It was quite dramatic and over-the-top bombastic from what I recall.

I'm going! Disappointed that it couldn't be Williams' standard Hollywood Bowl performance, but I saw it last year so at least I was able to see him once live. This should be very cool to watch, and will be good to compare it to the Royal Albert Hall performance live to score of Raiders which I'm also attending next year.

Oh, right... I was assuming he would be there in person. I guess it isn't likely for him to be there in person to introduce each day. I have assurances from Film Concerts Live that he will be there in person. Hoping those assurances are still correct.

I fear my lack of knowledge about Williams' concert schedules has made me look rather foolish.

OK, yes I'm wrong. Basing my question off of lack of recordings of the performances rather than looking at the actual programmes. Still odd that he never performs any themes from CoS or PoA though.

Now I can't be completely sure of this, but certainly excepting only a couple of occasions, there is no video evidence of him ever performing any piece from Harry Potter in one of his concerts. One exception was the Boston Pops performance of TPS in 2002/3. He also performed a few pieces with the Orlando Symphony for the opening of the Wizarding World of HP at Islands of Adventure in 2010. Aside from those though, he never seems to have scheduled any pieces from any of the three films in any of the concerts he conducts. Which is very odd considering some of his finest thematic work is contained within those three films. Does he dislike the scores? It certainly can't be down to popularity, because especially amongst the younger generation Harry Potter is one of his most prominent scores. Just a question I've long pondered, wondered if anyone could shed any light on it here. Perhaps there is just no recorded footage of it and he has performed it.

I've always loved the string line from 1:54-2:15 on this track from Philosopher's Stone. So much so that one day I had to transcribe it.

One of the greats. Premature but it would be a huge loss to film music if Horner were gone.

Harry Potter 1 celeste parts for just for starters!

He won't be conducting though, disappointingly. Emailed the company putting it on to ask, and got a fairly unenlightening response. Still, perhaps his only official public appearance of the year!

Absolutely love this score, and Benny's scores in general. Such a talented composer, and he does all his orchestration himself too. I'd encourage anyone to check out his score for Dragon's Prophet too.

Interesting dissertation but not sure I agree with this point: "It is without question that this accessibility has aided creativity". Certainly a question can be raised that ease of generating ideas is not good for creativity. It is good for producing product though. So creativity and product should not be equated and it seems you are equating it. Your conclusion states: "From a creative perspective however, the DAW has had an enormously positive impact – and creativity is ultimately the driving force behind music." but from a counter view, one could argue creativity is a result of knowledge, skill and toil. I see and note your point. My reference to creativity though is in regards to the multitude of ways in which audio can be manipulated and used to make infinite combinations of sounds within compositions; things that through software and plugins within the DAW can now be done as opposed to prior to it, when your available sound palette was in all reality comprised of real, existing instruments and their own capabilities. I totally agree that making something easier doesn't increase the quality of the final product, but expanding the options available for in this case, composers must be beneficial for the process whichever way you look at it.

I wrote my dissertation on this precise topic, if anyone fancies a read

This is fantastic, I especially love the piano and string combination around the 2 minute mark. Refreshing to hear a piece utilising a time signature throughout other than 4/4! Ironic given I'm about to post a very clichéd library style track I composed in a couple of hours last week. Note the standard Williams finish https://soundcloud.com/alastairadamsuk/brave-and-bold Uses a combination of EastWest Hollywood Brass and Woodwinds, EWQLSO percussion and Berlin Strings.

I guess so. You'd have thought he would want to do it though, then again the full E.T. score (if that's what it is) is quite a daunting amount of music to play live and in sync with the picture.

Why would he be there and introduce it but not conduct? Seems a strange arrangement to me. Would be a disappointment if he didn't conduct it.

Chamber of Secrets, JW. Not sure why but I always get this and the Seven Years of Tibet theme mixed up and kind of mash them together in my head.

It's not quite the same if he isn't conducting himself though. Nothing can beat a composer conducting his own scores, especially one like JW.

Great concert! Program looked very Williams-sparse until the encores (Imperial March, Yoda's Theme, Raiders and E.T) which more than made up for it

Do we get to see the program in advance, or is it a secret until the first night?

Fantastic review! I'm not ashamed to say that it was partly down to this score that I got into film music in the first place - for some reason it really stood out to my 13 year old self who had previously had little interest even in orchestral music in general. I'm incredibly surprised that Andy Price didn't get more work off the back of this; what producer/director could listen to this and not want him for their own project?

The last track (Home) is magnificent, I have to say. Reminiscent of the late 90's, early 00's ZImmer.