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I remember being very little and my grandma and my aunt were watching this on tv(a terrible way to watch this movie, as well as every movie), and I remember my aunt telling me the ending had alligators in it, but I don’t remember anything else since I was very little, but I do remember rhis….
 
Fast forward several years and I remember watching it with my dad and maybe my mom, not sure, and I think we had watched Raiders before because I knew the characters. I don’t remember any reactions I had throughout the movie, however, I do know that afterwards i immediately went upstairs to recreate the rope bridge sequence with my dressed up as Indy because that was one of the coolest things I had ever seen, and still is to this day. The behind the scenes story of the single take with multiple camera angles and the dummies falling into the gorge is incredible.
 
I love this movie the same way I love The Lost World. The last 30 minutes of the movie are balls off the wall fun, Steven Spielberg creating an over the top popcorn finale. Indy saves the kids, they escape the mines, there’s a runaway mine cart sequence…and after it comes to an end the heroes finally have a short rest moment…AND THEN A WAVE OF WATER JUST SHOWS UP!!! And the roller coaster continues! Indy overtaking the 2 swordsman with the funny nod to Raiders, then the rope bridge confrontation. I think the novelization has an interesting little take on this, it says something like “Indy wasn’t trapped on a bridge with the Thuggee…they’re trapped on a bridge with Indy!” And of course you have the joyous ending when the kids are reunited with their parents is so satisfying. I love it so much.

The earliest story ideas for Temple of Doom are from fall 1981/early 1982, when Lucas had just adopted a baby and was in a "happy" moment of his marriage, as far as we know.
The story conferences were held in April 1982. Lucas wrote the treatment in May 1982. The first draft was delivered in August 1982.
Marcia Lucas asked for the divorce around summer 1982, I believe. It wasn't officially announced until June 1983.
 
So yeah, I don't believe the basic elements from Temple of Doom come from Lucas' personal crisis.

The earliest story ideas for Temple of Doom are from fall 1981/early 1982, when Lucas had just adopted a baby and was in a "happy" moment of his marriage, as far as we know.
The story conferences were held in April 1982. Lucas wrote the treatment in May 1982. The first draft was delivered in August 1982.
Marcia Lucas asked for the divorce around summer 1982, I believe. It wasn't officially announced until June 1983.
 
So yeah, I don't believe the basic elements from Temple of Doom come from Lucas' personal crisis.

By that logic, you could cut the original and just watch The Empire Strikes Back...
 
The plot of the classic trilogy doesn't really start until a good halfway into Empire. Its only there that a bigger conflict with the Emperor is set-up: "Only a fully-trained Jedi knight, with the Force as his ally, could conquer Vader and his Emperor."
 
Both trilogies, to varying extent, have this presentation of a prelude, plus a more closely-knit duology of films. In both cases, its probably the result of a lack of forethought on the part of Lucas, although for different reasons.

Philosopher's Stone was the first OST album I owned. At that time, I only had the 1997 SW set and the TPM UE, so I assumed that a soundtrack album always included the complete soundtrack.
 
I had seen the film and the Diagon Alley/Great Hall music was one of my favourite pieces... and I just couldn't believe it wasn't on the set. That was my first encounter with the frustrating nature of the OST albums. 

I don't know whether I got this or LotR first, but both are textbook examples of albums missing vast amounts of music, and therefore maximum confusion for a new soundtrack fan.
 
But AFAIK this is the only example of Williams omitting music promised by a track title.

Philosopher's Stone was the first OST album I owned. At that time, I only had the 1997 SW set and the TPM UE, so I assumed that a soundtrack album always included the complete soundtrack.
 
I had seen the film and the Diagon Alley/Great Hall music was one of my favourite pieces... and I just couldn't believe it wasn't on the set. That was my first encounter with the frustrating nature of the OST albums. 

A 5 minute track was recorded to play throughout the scene, the walk through Diagon Alley was meant to be scored by the woodwinds and witchy fiddle. Then a "Reveal insert" was recorded to change the start of the reveal into an orchestral swell because it wasn't magical and awe-inspiring enough. Williams liked the music he wrote and expanded it into a longer, slower tempo concert piece in his Harry Potter Children's Suite for Orchestra, "Diagon Alley". For the original 1 disc soundtrack album release, Williams replaced the opening portion of his full recorded track with part of the Diagon Alley concert piece, this is "Diagon Alley and the Gringotts Vault" as you know it. For the movie, the filmmakers decided the reveal needed more of a warm happy reveal and excitement than a weird new world, so they replaced that same opening section with a latter track that Williams wrote for entering the Great Hall. (Confusingly, the track on the 1 disc soundtrack album called "Entry into the Great Hall and the Banquet" does NOT contain this entry music, only the banquet music.) The film also appends part of "Hermione's Feather" to the start of the track for the bricks moving out of the way. The LLL expanded release linked above has the original recorded track combined with the Reveal Insert in Disc 1 track 7, "Diagon Alley and The Gringotts Vault [Extended Version]", the Great Hall entrance in Disc 1 track 13, "Through the Doors", and the concert piece in Disc 3 track 8, "Diagon Alley". The original recorded opening of the track for Diagon Alley, the Reveal Insert, the full unedited concert piece and Through the Doors all premiered on the set, they were never before released, they were only available in a recording sessions leak with the exception of the Reveal Insert. I've done two videos about how the original opening and the reveal insert opening would've worked in the film:
 
 
 
 

I definitely like both. But to me, the original flows better. The redo feels a little choppy as it tries to navigate the happenings on the screen. It mostly feels like a chopped-up version of the original. (That being said, I really like the few passages that are unrelated to anything in the original version.)
 
Ultimately—pun intended—I'm just delighted to have them both complete and with pristine sound quality!

We're all very pleased with the final program, keeping it mind that there were factors that lead into some decisions, such as compact disc length, composer preference, fee increases for tracks over 10 minutes long, etc
 
Programming any expansion includes deciding what to do when there are multiple versions of cues in terms of which goes in the main program and which in the bonus tracks, and by and large sticking to having all the versions used in the film in the main program, and all the versions that were not as bonus tracks, made a lot of sense and led to each program being really strong.  Additionally, the careful selection of which score alternates should go at the end of disc 2, instead of disc 3, in order to make disc 3 be the best album it can be, worked out really well.  The one change a lot of people will probably do of taking those disc 2 tracks and adding them to the disc 3 album (as John Takis laid out somewhere here earlier), to basically make a longer Songs & Alts program, which is really just as valid as the structure we ended up with.  However, when released as three physical discs, I am glad that a big bonus program didn't start on disc 2, have a disc break, and then have it continue on disc 3.  It's kind of nicer to have disc 3 be more of its own thing. 
 
Like Mike has said, everything just kind of took a life of its own and came out perfectly in that regard.  The goal was to make a program that pleased us, the composer, and the lyricist, while adhering to the stipulations we had, and of course presenting the songs in the best way possible.  Since most of the songs are piano demos, if they were just lumped together in a row, they don't speak nearly as loudly as they do in the current album 3 configuration where you hear lushly orchestrated versions of the song melodies before or after those demos in the score alternates; it just makes everything work so well that way!
 
 
Now, when it comes down to it, the die hard fans are going to change things around the way they want anyway, and it's impossible to make a program that pleases everyone.  And sure, I'm a diehard fan as much as anyone, so I don't think there's any harm in stating some of my own preferences.
 
For Hook Trailer (Prologue), as much as I like the viola version of Peter's theme, I ultimately think the final performance edit made for the released trailer in 1991 is the strongest version of this music.  I am glad that the new track is completely different takes from that version throughout (instead of sticking the different sections into an otherwise same track), but for me it plays better as a bonus track opener, and keeping the 1991 performance edit version as the main version.  Just my preference.
 
For Yuppie Sounds (Banning Back Home), I prefer Williams' original version, with the fun improv section, over the revision that was recorded at the last minute because of a picture change.  We actually discussed making the original version be main program version, but there actually wasn't space on the discs to swap them, since the original version is a minute longer than the revised one!  But since the revision is what's in the film it worked out nicely in that regard anyway.
 
For the first part of Looney Wendy (The Stories Are True), I prefer the original version with the twisted version of the "Childhood" theme, over the later revision that is just a re-done Forgotten How To Fly with the "Mothers" theme mostly removed.  This version actually was in the main program for a while, but having the "Childhood" version on disc 3 ultimately made that disc so much stronger.  And again because the revision is what's in the film it worked out nicely anyway.
 
For The Lost Boy Chase, I really like the percussion insert section.  But John Williams wanted the album version in the main program.  I don't really think it matters much either way.  If anything, having to present the first two minutes of this cue three times (because it was used in the end credits) is the biggest issue with the final product, but also an issue that just has no workaround.  At least each instance is on a different disc!
 
For the entire grand finale, I prefer to have from Tink Grows Up through The End of Hook to just be one single 24 minute track with all cues seguing directly into each other, instead of broken up into 4 tracks.  Just my preference.
 
One thing I still haven't decided on after all this time is my final thoughts on the Kensington Extension (the final part of Farewell Neverland (Short Version / Alternate)).  At first it was so jarring to hear, but I kind of love it more and more every time I hear it, and am now expecting it when I get to the end of the score.  And yet there's something about the simplicity (for lack of a better word) of the original version's ending that can't be denied.  So, I'm still undecided which I like better! 
 
I think that's about it.  I still haven't fiddled with trying to put God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen and Take Me Out To The Ballgame in the main program or anything.  And I don't think there's any merit in trying to put the other songs into the main program, not even "Low Below".  Not having Bob Hoskins performing as Smee there would be too weird I think (and you'd have to lose Show Us The Hook, which is one of my favorite parts of the score).   Moira's Lullaby seems like it would fit in well if not for the fact that the Saying Goodnight cue effectively replaces it.

It's definitely a challenge, given how frustratingly incomplete and jumbled the score's presentation is. I'm not approaching any of the 9 as if they need any special defending. But in the case of TROS, I do feel I can offer a small corrective to what I see as a kind of mistreatment of Williams's swan song, both by the filmmakers and (more vexingly to me) the general public.
 
 
 
I doubt there will be an audiobook -- it'd be unprecedented if there were for this particular book series (the Oxford Music/Media line). Though who knows... with AI emulation these days, maybe someone could enter all the text in and have it read back to you in the voice of Ian McDiarmid!
 
There certainly will be an online companion though that has lots of short clips and such on it.
 
 
 
I'm sure I'll cite Kalinak's chapter somewhere, though it's not especially central to what I'm doing. I don't know Evensen's SW/Wagner work, though, trust me, that angle is something I've got plenty to say about. Particularly since I think a lot of the existing scholarly treatment of the Williams/Wagner connection is at best superficial. But the man is a black hole: get too close and he completely dominates whatever subject you thought you were writing about before. So I'm trying to take care to keep the focus on JW rather than him.

Yes. The insert includes both the new music and part of the original cue in a shortened form, until it fades back into the ending of the original cue.
 

1:11-2:15
 
Here's the phase-inverted waveform as proof:
 

 
(The bit after the end of the insert is faded-in on the track with the insert, that's why there's still visible waveform at that point)

My ideal Never-Feast version would insert Cornucopia, but then continue the OST version unmodified. Best of both worlds.

Wow, thanks everyone!  Obviously, the most important question to address is how I got those italics. Simple! https://lingojam.com/FacebookFonts 

As for the timeframe: I have over a year to hand in the finished manuscript, but my goal is to have it completed well before that. It's a big book, and publishing is a very slow process. But everything so far is proceeding as I have forseen...
 
It's not a guide to the scores really, but something more holistic, with each chapter looking at cues from all three trilogies from some angle: musical referentiality, thematic transformation, concert arrangements, and so on. There will be a ton of music examples (all my own annotated transcriptions as usu.), hopefully presented in an accessible way that draws in people who can't read sheet music. I know notation and music-theory jargon can be intimidating, and I'm hyper-aware of the potential gatekeeping effect it could on an already niche readership. But at the same time, I think we can all agree this music warrants deep and serious analysis! It's a balancing act for sure... 
 
Alas, I don't have special access to recordings, and can't speak to official expanded album releases, as amazing as they would be! 
 
Incidentally: I don't see it trumpeted nearly enough on these boards but Chloé Huvet came out with a book on SW music (mainly the OT and PT) a couple years ago that is absolutely brilliant and similarly synthetic in approach. The book is in French, which limits the audience, but it's worth getting your hands on if only for the fantastic music examples and charts.  The amount of insight in her prose is incredible too, and it's been a major source of inspriation to me. 

The happy news I cryptically alluded to last week is now something I can make official: I just signed a book contract with OUP for 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘚𝘬𝘺𝘸𝘢𝘭𝘬𝘦𝘳 𝘚𝘺𝘮𝘱𝘩𝘰𝘯𝘪𝘦𝘴: 𝘔𝘶𝘴𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘭 𝘚𝘵𝘰𝘳𝘺𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘪𝘯 𝘚𝘵𝘢𝘳 𝘞𝘢𝘳𝘴!   It's a book it feels like I've been writing in my head for a long, long time -- since middle school, kinda? And unless Williams somehow returns to write another entry in the series, I'm treating it a chance to provide a properly 𝘴𝘺𝘯𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘵𝘪𝘤 investigation into these scores, all nine of them.   Even Rise of Skywalker?? 𝘌𝘴𝘱𝘦𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 Rise of Skywalker!   My hope is this book does some justice to the complexity, challenge, and sheer magic of this music.   Now, back to the grindstone!   https://www.facebook.com/Falstaft/posts/pfbid0L6wUjeDDxj6AmhwHh1f9obrVMJfYbPx4GJM8YaEWiZtqxwp37A88monPFVDxBQ26l  
Congratulations, @Falstaft!

Yes.
Furthermore, in the London scenes, there is no music whenever the scene deals with the "real word". The music is used for when the "magic" creeps into the scenes (Wendy's first appearance, the haunted nursery scene, Wendy telling her story...) and is interrupted when Peter breaks the magic (when he closes the window for example).
 
Once we get to Neverland, the film is scored pretty much wall-to-wall (although some sections were ultimately unused).
 
 
It's an interesting way of scoring the film, similar to the first Harry Potter films. No music when there's no magic.
 
 

Yes.
Furthermore, in the London scenes, there is no music whenever the scene deals with the "real word". The music is used for when the "magic" creeps into the scenes (Wendy's first appearance, the haunted nursery scene, Wendy telling her story...) and is interrupted when Peter breaks the magic (when he closes the window for example).
 
Once we get to Neverland, the film is scored pretty much wall-to-wall (although some sections were ultimately unused).
 
 
It's an interesting way of scoring the film, similar to the first Harry Potter films. No music when there's no magic.
 
 

Yes.
Furthermore, in the London scenes, there is no music whenever the scene deals with the "real word". The music is used for when the "magic" creeps into the scenes (Wendy's first appearance, the haunted nursery scene, Wendy telling her story...) and is interrupted when Peter breaks the magic (when he closes the window for example).
 
Once we get to Neverland, the film is scored pretty much wall-to-wall (although some sections were ultimately unused).
 
 
It's an interesting way of scoring the film, similar to the first Harry Potter films. No music when there's no magic.
 
 

Or Empire of the Sun - music only when Jim is imagining a better world

Yes.
Furthermore, in the London scenes, there is no music whenever the scene deals with the "real word". The music is used for when the "magic" creeps into the scenes (Wendy's first appearance, the haunted nursery scene, Wendy telling her story...) and is interrupted when Peter breaks the magic (when he closes the window for example).
 
Once we get to Neverland, the film is scored pretty much wall-to-wall (although some sections were ultimately unused).
 
 
It's an interesting way of scoring the film, similar to the first Harry Potter films. No music when there's no magic.
 
 

I think the point of it is to set the opening Los Angeles sequence apart from the rest of the film.
 
The early LA scenes have their own musical identity, just the diagetic piano at the school play, and then Banning Back Home for the montage of everything else that happens there.  Once they get to London - a "magical place", the actual score properly kicks in with the Childhood theme as Wendy is seen at the top of the stairs.

For me, ROTJ and TOD share a lot in common with respect to their scores.  It's just Williams going balls to the wall with a jubilance and sheer for the hell of it fun that both projects allowed.  ESB (my favorite score of all time) has fun, but its general tenor is more serious and thus a bit more restrained on this front.
 
Perhaps too its the 83-85ish mood and mode of Williams.  The Olympic theme is perfection and NBC news stuff--especially the insanity of the fugue and scherzo is just plain over the top fun.  He seems to show zero restraint and zero concerns over things like "too many notes."  
 
So, I've got nothing on sound quality concerns, but this is why is sounds different to me. 

I believe only the space battle cue that consists of material from ANH was the only thing recorded at Olympic. All the other orchestral stuff should have been at Abbey Road, so that's not it.
 
That being said, I do think the magic of Abbey Road has something to do with how good ROTJ sounds in non-SE releases. Something just went wrong with the SE album specifically. Which is unfortunate, because the program is so outstanding. There are many scores that I prefer to hear abridged. The Star Wars scores are not among them—especially not the first six.

I also think the LSO outclasses the LA group. The LSO brass is still outstanding, but it was a murderer's row of world class talent in the early 2000s. The strings were also much better. I would have loved it if the ST scores had gotten recorded with them.