igger6

Silvestri never wrote Marvel Studios logo music (although his Avengers and Captain America themes are the best Marvel music yet written).   Brian Tyler wrote a fanfare that was 98 percent identical to his theme for Thor 2 (with which said fanfare debuted), and if I'm not mistaken, the only other film to open with it was Guardians of the Galaxy (maybe Ant-Man, too).
 
But this is absolutely stellar!  It's optimistic, memorable, wondrous, fist-pumping, old-school—absolutely everything a JWFan should want in a superhero studio logo.  It manages to sum-up the "culture" of the MCU perfectly.  It's even got a sort of A-B structure to it.  Lesser composers have built entire superhero scores out of less melodic material than is contained in these 36 seconds.  And to my untrained ear, even the recording sounds somehow "classic."  (If I knew what I was talking about, I'd say something about reverb here.)  Dr. Strange can't come fast enough for my money.

Tintin, War Horse and Lincoln are all above average JW scores spanning different genres. Lincoln is an incredibly heartfelt and touching score. Parts of KOTCS may be by-the-numbers but it suffers from a remarkably poor album presentation and the actual highlights (including the complete jungle chase) contains some of the best music he has written this millennium.
 
There is no denying that his compositional style has changed throughout the years but that doesn't mean his writing is of poorer quality. Having had 7+ months to digest TFA, I'd place it above AOTC and ROTS. It is a 5 star score through and through - he scored the biggest movie of 2015 with the year's best score so I strongly disagree with the idea that he should focus only on more intimate films. JW is not just a composer but an expert musical story teller regardless of the genre or scope of the movie.
 
As for BFG, the compositional skill on display is extraordinary. It may be an average entry in his career, but an average JW score is still one of the year's best. I haven't seen the movie, but by all accounts, it is a light and fluffy movie and therefore the score is equally light and fluffy. If the movie doesn't have ET or War Horse levels of emotional weight, the score can't be expected to have that too. It is a great listening experience on album and I enjoy it a lot.
 

My copy of this Blu-Ray came in today, and it is stellar.  I never considered myself a massive Horner fan, aside from a few favorites—and I've had my share of fun at his expense for musical recycling—but holy cow, is there ever a ton of great music on this disc.  The camera work is also great, very up close and personal; you almost feel acquainted with certain instrumentalists by the end, and they repeatedly cut to Horner in the audience, which is touching and effective. 
 
But back to the music!  I haven't found any arranging credits in the liner notes, but many of the pieces are not soundtrack arrangements, which is a huge plus in my book.  If I want to hear top-notch musicians play the stock arrangements, I'll spin the OSTs.  Here are thoughts on a few highlights.  (The program starts with an "On to Other Worlds" section that isn't focused on Horner but contains some excellent cuts as a bonus.)
 
"Hollywood in Vienna" Fanfare (Bruce Broughton)
Why must Broughton make do with gigs like this?  Still, he overachieves, write an energetic kickstarter piece that ingeniously interpolates Max Steiner's Gone With the Wind Tara theme (this being the site of the Max Steiner Award presentation, after all).
 
Space Mountain (Bramson)
I'd never heard this before as far as I know, and it didn't knock my socks off, but it's suitably wondrous and stately given the retro sci-fi theme of Disneyland Paris's Space Mountain.  It's surprising how slow it is for a roller coaster soundtrack...
 
Gattaca (Michael Nyman)
Never heard this before, but it's sad and lovely.
 
Independence Day (Arnold)
YES!  Seeing this on the tracklist is part of what sealed the deal on my purchase, and it's everything you'd hope.  The choir really shines when they come in on this one, and while it's not a straight-up reading of the incredible end titles, it does eventually come around to that incomparable fanfare.
 
Star Trek Medley (Courage, Goldsmith, Rosenman, Eidelman, Giacchino)
This is absolutely stellar (sorry :)) and again really credits the choir.  I never fully appreciated Goldsmith's Voyager music until now.  The Motion Picture/Next Generation fanfare sounds great in a seemingly new arrangement, and Giacchino's contribution has never sounded more at home among its peers.
 
Where Dreams Are Born (The Maestro)
Awesome to see this performed live.  The concert's wordless vocalist disappointed me later on the Titanic medley, but she does great work here; this is one of JW's most gorgeous melodies, and it's hard to screw it up.
 
Now on to some of the Horner pieces...
 
Universal Theme
I'm so into the Goldsmith fanfare (especially Brian Tyler's arrangement of it) that I'd forgotten about this melody until this performance started, but it took me right back to various '90s movies of my childhood.
 
Legends of the Fall
What a gorgeous melody.  I've never seen the movie, but I fell in love with "The Ludlows" on first listen.
 
Horner Medley
A 1986-2001 highlight reel that covers some great ground, if a bit too quickly.  I was sorry not to hear "Kaleidoscope of Mathematics" representing A Beautiful Mind; they went with the slower (love?) theme, but I've always liked "Kaleidoscope" as the apotheosis of Horner's long flirtation with kinetic science music.  Mask of Zorro sounded great, and I wish they'd played a full piece from that masterful score.  (They probably couldn't find any castanets in Vienna...)
 
Braveheart
They skipped the love theme!  As a result, this was forgettable for me, as I've never been much into the rest of this score.  But thanks to my curiosity and my smartphone, I now know the difference between bagpipes and Uilleann pipes
 
AVATAR
Wha...where has this score been?!  I avoided it out of anti-Horner pique and general contrarianism back when the movie was breaking records.  This medley blew me away, though, especially the battle music at the end.  It was truly breathtaking, and as a result I've been Spotifying the soundtrack as I write this.  Great stuff.
 
Titanic
This medley was LONG, but I was riveted.  The vocalist left a bit to be desired (she didn't have the youthful purity of whoever sings on the OST), but the choir and instrumental soloists owned this piece.  "Southampton" has literally never sounded this good, with actual talented Homo sapiens replacing that obnoxious synth choir that's been bugging me for two decades.  I could imagine Horner in the audience thinking, "Holy cow, that's what it was supposed to sound like!"  And every Irish instrument I can't name sounded like a million euros (or are they back to pounds now? ).  It's great to see Horner grin when the crowd starts applauding after the last big chord, but before the final strings have their say.  (The conductor, David Newman, actually holds up his hand to stop the early applause.)
 
"Somewhere Out There" and "If We Hold On Together"
Both of Horner's sappy 1980s animation masterpieces are sung with gusto by vocalists I've never heard of.  (The guy also plays piano on "Somewhere Out There," looks hilariously similar to Vin Diesel, and pretty much materializes in a puff of smoke to join in the finale of "If We Hold On.")  These sound great, especially the harmony in their climaxes.
 
The Amazing Spider-Man
OK, this wasn't technically on the program, but I thought it was hilarious that it played as a triumphant fanfare while Horner took the stage to receive the award.  He spoke a couple of halting sentences in German and then gave an brief, humble, and funny acceptance speech in English.  Maybe it's just sentimentality talking, but he really came across as the real deal.  What a loss.
 
Honestly, I think this disc has more value packed into it than the similar Williams/Dudamel Blu-Ray.  (Heresy, I know, but there's too much Schindler and Fiddler on there.)  I haven't even scratched the surface of what is apparently a 75-minute interview with Horner.  Some angles have a bit of grain in the picture, but the vast majority of the shots are pristine. 
 
The concert is technically on YouTube, but buy the Blu-Ray so we'll get more releases like this!  It's not terribly expensive for the quality of the product, and it's great to see it on a TV screen.  Highly, highly recommended.

My copy of this Blu-Ray came in today, and it is stellar.  I never considered myself a massive Horner fan, aside from a few favorites—and I've had my share of fun at his expense for musical recycling—but holy cow, is there ever a ton of great music on this disc.  The camera work is also great, very up close and personal; you almost feel acquainted with certain instrumentalists by the end, and they repeatedly cut to Horner in the audience, which is touching and effective. 
 
But back to the music!  I haven't found any arranging credits in the liner notes, but many of the pieces are not soundtrack arrangements, which is a huge plus in my book.  If I want to hear top-notch musicians play the stock arrangements, I'll spin the OSTs.  Here are thoughts on a few highlights.  (The program starts with an "On to Other Worlds" section that isn't focused on Horner but contains some excellent cuts as a bonus.)
 
"Hollywood in Vienna" Fanfare (Bruce Broughton)
Why must Broughton make do with gigs like this?  Still, he overachieves, write an energetic kickstarter piece that ingeniously interpolates Max Steiner's Gone With the Wind Tara theme (this being the site of the Max Steiner Award presentation, after all).
 
Space Mountain (Bramson)
I'd never heard this before as far as I know, and it didn't knock my socks off, but it's suitably wondrous and stately given the retro sci-fi theme of Disneyland Paris's Space Mountain.  It's surprising how slow it is for a roller coaster soundtrack...
 
Gattaca (Michael Nyman)
Never heard this before, but it's sad and lovely.
 
Independence Day (Arnold)
YES!  Seeing this on the tracklist is part of what sealed the deal on my purchase, and it's everything you'd hope.  The choir really shines when they come in on this one, and while it's not a straight-up reading of the incredible end titles, it does eventually come around to that incomparable fanfare.
 
Star Trek Medley (Courage, Goldsmith, Rosenman, Eidelman, Giacchino)
This is absolutely stellar (sorry :)) and again really credits the choir.  I never fully appreciated Goldsmith's Voyager music until now.  The Motion Picture/Next Generation fanfare sounds great in a seemingly new arrangement, and Giacchino's contribution has never sounded more at home among its peers.
 
Where Dreams Are Born (The Maestro)
Awesome to see this performed live.  The concert's wordless vocalist disappointed me later on the Titanic medley, but she does great work here; this is one of JW's most gorgeous melodies, and it's hard to screw it up.
 
Now on to some of the Horner pieces...
 
Universal Theme
I'm so into the Goldsmith fanfare (especially Brian Tyler's arrangement of it) that I'd forgotten about this melody until this performance started, but it took me right back to various '90s movies of my childhood.
 
Legends of the Fall
What a gorgeous melody.  I've never seen the movie, but I fell in love with "The Ludlows" on first listen.
 
Horner Medley
A 1986-2001 highlight reel that covers some great ground, if a bit too quickly.  I was sorry not to hear "Kaleidoscope of Mathematics" representing A Beautiful Mind; they went with the slower (love?) theme, but I've always liked "Kaleidoscope" as the apotheosis of Horner's long flirtation with kinetic science music.  Mask of Zorro sounded great, and I wish they'd played a full piece from that masterful score.  (They probably couldn't find any castanets in Vienna...)
 
Braveheart
They skipped the love theme!  As a result, this was forgettable for me, as I've never been much into the rest of this score.  But thanks to my curiosity and my smartphone, I now know the difference between bagpipes and Uilleann pipes
 
AVATAR
Wha...where has this score been?!  I avoided it out of anti-Horner pique and general contrarianism back when the movie was breaking records.  This medley blew me away, though, especially the battle music at the end.  It was truly breathtaking, and as a result I've been Spotifying the soundtrack as I write this.  Great stuff.
 
Titanic
This medley was LONG, but I was riveted.  The vocalist left a bit to be desired (she didn't have the youthful purity of whoever sings on the OST), but the choir and instrumental soloists owned this piece.  "Southampton" has literally never sounded this good, with actual talented Homo sapiens replacing that obnoxious synth choir that's been bugging me for two decades.  I could imagine Horner in the audience thinking, "Holy cow, that's what it was supposed to sound like!"  And every Irish instrument I can't name sounded like a million euros (or are they back to pounds now? ).  It's great to see Horner grin when the crowd starts applauding after the last big chord, but before the final strings have their say.  (The conductor, David Newman, actually holds up his hand to stop the early applause.)
 
"Somewhere Out There" and "If We Hold On Together"
Both of Horner's sappy 1980s animation masterpieces are sung with gusto by vocalists I've never heard of.  (The guy also plays piano on "Somewhere Out There," looks hilariously similar to Vin Diesel, and pretty much materializes in a puff of smoke to join in the finale of "If We Hold On.")  These sound great, especially the harmony in their climaxes.
 
The Amazing Spider-Man
OK, this wasn't technically on the program, but I thought it was hilarious that it played as a triumphant fanfare while Horner took the stage to receive the award.  He spoke a couple of halting sentences in German and then gave an brief, humble, and funny acceptance speech in English.  Maybe it's just sentimentality talking, but he really came across as the real deal.  What a loss.
 
Honestly, I think this disc has more value packed into it than the similar Williams/Dudamel Blu-Ray.  (Heresy, I know, but there's too much Schindler and Fiddler on there.)  I haven't even scratched the surface of what is apparently a 75-minute interview with Horner.  Some angles have a bit of grain in the picture, but the vast majority of the shots are pristine. 
 
The concert is technically on YouTube, but buy the Blu-Ray so we'll get more releases like this!  It's not terribly expensive for the quality of the product, and it's great to see it on a TV screen.  Highly, highly recommended.

My copy of this Blu-Ray came in today, and it is stellar.  I never considered myself a massive Horner fan, aside from a few favorites—and I've had my share of fun at his expense for musical recycling—but holy cow, is there ever a ton of great music on this disc.  The camera work is also great, very up close and personal; you almost feel acquainted with certain instrumentalists by the end, and they repeatedly cut to Horner in the audience, which is touching and effective. 
 
But back to the music!  I haven't found any arranging credits in the liner notes, but many of the pieces are not soundtrack arrangements, which is a huge plus in my book.  If I want to hear top-notch musicians play the stock arrangements, I'll spin the OSTs.  Here are thoughts on a few highlights.  (The program starts with an "On to Other Worlds" section that isn't focused on Horner but contains some excellent cuts as a bonus.)
 
"Hollywood in Vienna" Fanfare (Bruce Broughton)
Why must Broughton make do with gigs like this?  Still, he overachieves, write an energetic kickstarter piece that ingeniously interpolates Max Steiner's Gone With the Wind Tara theme (this being the site of the Max Steiner Award presentation, after all).
 
Space Mountain (Bramson)
I'd never heard this before as far as I know, and it didn't knock my socks off, but it's suitably wondrous and stately given the retro sci-fi theme of Disneyland Paris's Space Mountain.  It's surprising how slow it is for a roller coaster soundtrack...
 
Gattaca (Michael Nyman)
Never heard this before, but it's sad and lovely.
 
Independence Day (Arnold)
YES!  Seeing this on the tracklist is part of what sealed the deal on my purchase, and it's everything you'd hope.  The choir really shines when they come in on this one, and while it's not a straight-up reading of the incredible end titles, it does eventually come around to that incomparable fanfare.
 
Star Trek Medley (Courage, Goldsmith, Rosenman, Eidelman, Giacchino)
This is absolutely stellar (sorry :)) and again really credits the choir.  I never fully appreciated Goldsmith's Voyager music until now.  The Motion Picture/Next Generation fanfare sounds great in a seemingly new arrangement, and Giacchino's contribution has never sounded more at home among its peers.
 
Where Dreams Are Born (The Maestro)
Awesome to see this performed live.  The concert's wordless vocalist disappointed me later on the Titanic medley, but she does great work here; this is one of JW's most gorgeous melodies, and it's hard to screw it up.
 
Now on to some of the Horner pieces...
 
Universal Theme
I'm so into the Goldsmith fanfare (especially Brian Tyler's arrangement of it) that I'd forgotten about this melody until this performance started, but it took me right back to various '90s movies of my childhood.
 
Legends of the Fall
What a gorgeous melody.  I've never seen the movie, but I fell in love with "The Ludlows" on first listen.
 
Horner Medley
A 1986-2001 highlight reel that covers some great ground, if a bit too quickly.  I was sorry not to hear "Kaleidoscope of Mathematics" representing A Beautiful Mind; they went with the slower (love?) theme, but I've always liked "Kaleidoscope" as the apotheosis of Horner's long flirtation with kinetic science music.  Mask of Zorro sounded great, and I wish they'd played a full piece from that masterful score.  (They probably couldn't find any castanets in Vienna...)
 
Braveheart
They skipped the love theme!  As a result, this was forgettable for me, as I've never been much into the rest of this score.  But thanks to my curiosity and my smartphone, I now know the difference between bagpipes and Uilleann pipes
 
AVATAR
Wha...where has this score been?!  I avoided it out of anti-Horner pique and general contrarianism back when the movie was breaking records.  This medley blew me away, though, especially the battle music at the end.  It was truly breathtaking, and as a result I've been Spotifying the soundtrack as I write this.  Great stuff.
 
Titanic
This medley was LONG, but I was riveted.  The vocalist left a bit to be desired (she didn't have the youthful purity of whoever sings on the OST), but the choir and instrumental soloists owned this piece.  "Southampton" has literally never sounded this good, with actual talented Homo sapiens replacing that obnoxious synth choir that's been bugging me for two decades.  I could imagine Horner in the audience thinking, "Holy cow, that's what it was supposed to sound like!"  And every Irish instrument I can't name sounded like a million euros (or are they back to pounds now? ).  It's great to see Horner grin when the crowd starts applauding after the last big chord, but before the final strings have their say.  (The conductor, David Newman, actually holds up his hand to stop the early applause.)
 
"Somewhere Out There" and "If We Hold On Together"
Both of Horner's sappy 1980s animation masterpieces are sung with gusto by vocalists I've never heard of.  (The guy also plays piano on "Somewhere Out There," looks hilariously similar to Vin Diesel, and pretty much materializes in a puff of smoke to join in the finale of "If We Hold On.")  These sound great, especially the harmony in their climaxes.
 
The Amazing Spider-Man
OK, this wasn't technically on the program, but I thought it was hilarious that it played as a triumphant fanfare while Horner took the stage to receive the award.  He spoke a couple of halting sentences in German and then gave an brief, humble, and funny acceptance speech in English.  Maybe it's just sentimentality talking, but he really came across as the real deal.  What a loss.
 
Honestly, I think this disc has more value packed into it than the similar Williams/Dudamel Blu-Ray.  (Heresy, I know, but there's too much Schindler and Fiddler on there.)  I haven't even scratched the surface of what is apparently a 75-minute interview with Horner.  Some angles have a bit of grain in the picture, but the vast majority of the shots are pristine. 
 
The concert is technically on YouTube, but buy the Blu-Ray so we'll get more releases like this!  It's not terribly expensive for the quality of the product, and it's great to see it on a TV screen.  Highly, highly recommended.

Thanks to @TownerFan pointing out that this new CD was on Spotify (Why isn't BSX promoting this release themselves at all??), we listened to it last night while painting.

It's a nice CD, for sure!  I enjoyed the blend of established hits we've heard a million times with some deep cuts that showcase how the maestro's always been on the top of the game.
 
I think my favorite tracks after the first listen were Family Plot (really fun!), The Book Thief (great arrangement), Lincoln (ditto, the simplicity makes the melodies shine), and ET (wonderful).

I'll be listening again for sure

"Fawkes the Phoenix" is, in my book, the most underrated theme in the HP franchise and the most recent example of Williams in jaw-dropping, straight-out-of-heaven-gorgeous melody mode, without any of the technical filigree that complicates parts of Lincoln and War Horse for me.  It's Williams back in Born on the Fourth of July / "Somewhere in my Memory" / Force Theme form (a mode I was afraid we were done with until he revisited it for Rey's Theme).  Hearing Enguerrand-Friedrich Lühl finally cover "Fawkes" on his recent album made me realize anew the lack of love it gets in the admittedly small genre of Williams chamber covers.
 
OK, as I'm reading this, the live version of "With Malice Toward None" kicked in and made me think I'm being too hard on the old boy.  That's also pretty gorgeous.  But it doesn't have the catchy songlike phrase structure of his most timeless stuff.  Also, I teach literature, and the way the concert suite emulates the life cycle of a phoenix (nice pretty bird, fiery inferno, triumphant return, nice pretty bird again) is ingenious musical storytelling.  It almost makes me wonder why Williams bothered composing the "Chamber of Secrets" theme when he had a perfectly good menacing villain theme embedded in "Fawkes" that, if memory serves, we never actually hear in the film.  (Then again, does "Chamber of Secrets" play in the film either?  So much pointless overachieving in that score.  I don't get why it seems so forgotten.)
 
"Dobby the House Elf" is also cute, serviceable, and songlike in the best '80s-Williams way, which serves to highlight the fact that Chamber of Secrets is probably my desert-island Potter score, considering it reprises much of the best stuff from Sorcerer's Stone while adding some positively cracking new themes.  (Can we talk about "The Spiders"?!)
 
OK, irrelevant tangent concluded.
 
P.S. Wait, one more!  The best thing about "Battle of the Heroes" is that it inspired John Debney to rip it off and improve on it in Lair.  (There needs to be a word for ripoffs that improve on the original, like "Parade of the Ewoks."  How about "stealevation"?)

It's not my absolute favorite or anything but I've always had a soft spot for "Dobby the House Elf".

Since no one has pointed it out yet, the David Collins observation that stuttersteps referenced is that
 

 
I don't remember Collins' thematic justification for this, but it satisfied me at the time.
 

Wow. Whether he wins or not, Williams has now earned as many Oscar nominations from 2011-15 as he did from 1975-80. Who would have predicted that five years ago?

Wow. Whether he wins or not, Williams has now earned as many Oscar nominations from 2011-15 as he did from 1975-80. Who would have predicted that five years ago?

As I began my annual post-Thanksgiving dive into the year's new Christmas music, I chanced to discover these two JW covers within 24 hours of each other.
First up is a swinging big band rendition of "Somewhere in my Memory" by Gordon Goodwin's Big Phat Band, from their new Christmas album "A Big Phat Christmas - Wrap This." If you can handle jazz with a couple of meandering solos, you'll quite enjoy this comparatively high-energy version of the choral classic:

If you're feeling even more adventurous, check out this surprisingly faithful rendition of the Home Alone main titles by August Burns Red, a punk/metal band. I know absolutely nothing about punk rock or heavy metal, so I might be classifying this incorrectly, but whatever genre it belongs to, this strikes me as an extremely lovingly produced track. It's light-years from the Maestro's style, but also meticulously faithful in its way. Enjoy!

And finally, if you've ever wondered what the end credits suite to a John Williams score for the ultimate Christmas movie would sound like, check out this oddball effort from Michael W. Smith, a Christian music titan from the '80s and '90s whose success convinced him to try his hand at orchestral composition on one of his Christmas albums a few years back. This track, "It's a Wonderful Christmas," plays like a love letter to the Home Alone and Harry Potter scores, and its melodies and use of the orchestra strut right down Main Street in Williamsville. Great stuff:

Merry Christmas season! Keep the change, ya filthy animals!

I second Henry's observations about the Williams quotes in those two tracks. I love the equal-opportunity spirit Giacchino shows toward quoting in this score; except for the wholesale reprise in "Welcome to Jurassic World" and the arguably unimaginative island theme quote in "As the Jurassic World Turns," there's some nice, subtle nods to the earlier scores that feel intelligent rather than obligatory.

If we can't get Joel McNeely, this is actually great news. Desplat can do literally anything and do it decently. What his Potter scores lacked in twinkly Williams-esque magic was mostly a product, I think, of the films' tone, not a reflection of his ability to channel Williams when he wants to. Just listen to Monuments Men, Godzilla, Rise of the Guardians, The Fantastic Mr. Fox, and Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium in that order, with any of his Oscar-bait scores interspersed in between, and you'll agree that he's probably the most talented chameleon we've got.
And if nothing else, his Wes Anderson scores prove him the single composer most likely to write an appropriate successor to "Cantina Band"!

Awesome! Amazing work!

Superman. It works great in X-Men 3.
Karol

Thanks for the excellent write-up.
Karol

igger6 thanks for that excellent write-up, it was a pleasure to read!

Plagiarist!
Karol

AMAZING show on Sunday! I saw him with the CSO in 2007, which was much more of a "Greatest Hits" program, I thought, as opposed to the selection of comparatively "deep" tracks he played today. There were a higher proportion of classic crowd-pleasers in '07, but I didn't enjoy this one any less. I was in the upper balcony, and with my trusty pair of binoculars, I had the best seat in the house, with clear views of everyone but the trumpets and some of the percussion, who were camped out behind the screen. (Can't the CSO afford a retractable screen? There's an awfully long donor list in the program...) I'd say the standout section of the ensemble was the trombones, who lit up all the up-tempo selections with bold and melodic lines. I'm an orchestral layperson if ever there were one, so time after time I would sweep my viewfinder from one end of the brass to the other, seeking the source of that righteous racket, and it was almost always the trombones. Big kudos as well to the flute and piccolo players, who popped in and out precisely at the appointed times to dress up or punctuate the big melodies with long or short runs, as well as nailing key solos in the slower material. And of course, the hardest-rocking man on stage, the timpani player, brought every crescendo section over the top.
The program followed what was posted exactly, with the addition of a salute to Hollywood leading ladies set to the theme from Laura, which Gil Shaham stuck around to play as a "personal favor" to the Maestro before the intermission. The encores were the same as reported above, too. The Cowboys overture was a thrilling and energetic opener; I've never heard the full overture live—certainly never under Williams' baton—and it's really a gorgeous, cohesive piece of music, one of those film suites that seems to tell a story in and of itself. The same is even truer of Close Encounters, and speaking as one who's immune to the charms of the film, I loved seeing what amounted to a highlight reel of the movie's few memorable scenes on the projector screen, accompanied by a blessedly short summary of the score's menacing suspense material and a full rendering of its transcendent climax. (I don't use that word loosely, but the ending of that suite really embodies it for me.) Jaws was pleasant, as always, though I'm too young for this to be one of my favorites. (That was, I think, the only outright repeat from 2007 in the main program, and, now as then, I couldn't find the demarcation point between "Out to Sea" and "The Shark Cage Fugue.") I find it curious that, in two concerts, Williams has included selections from this score without touching the concert suite of the main theme (not that I miss it; these pieces are more enjoyable).
Shaham's section was next, and I actually found this section less engaging than the rest, partly because it consisted mostly of non-Williams compositions, and partly because Shaham—a formidable player who really seems to enjoy himself—was a bit poorly amplified. Still, it was a pleasant surprise to hear Williams' orchestral arrangement of "Por Una Cabeza" from Scent of a Woman, which is a treasure I'd only recently unearthed, and the Fiddler medley, which was masterfully arranged, with melodies bouncing all over the orchestra. (I wonder how long it's been since JW conducted that one. I can't imagine it's been at the top of his concert playlists since...well, probably before he gave concerts.) Schindler's List was moving, of course, and quite powerful live (another one I'd never experienced that way). Several concertgoers in my section of the house were moved to a spontaneous standing ovation at the end. This is as good a time as any to note that on every single selection, the CSO was tighter than shrink-wrap. Close your eyes, and they might as well have been blaring the CD versions of any of these selections (with a few pleasant exceptions below).
The Laura starlet montage brought us to the intermission. I always love catching snatches of upcoming selections from rehearsing musicians before and between shows, and I heard a horn player limbering up for "Flight to Neverland" once the musicians started to return. That was the first selection of the second half, another I hadn't heard live from the Maestro, and another knockout. This one featured the flying montage that I've read about before. As it began, I was begrudging the presence of the screen, because it always means lowered lights on the stage and less attention on the musicians. After a minute or so, though, I was won over by the sheer quality of the montage. Someone must have slaved over licensing, sequencing, and synchronizing the clips, which covered a wide swath of decades, studios, and genres. And kudos to Williams and the musicians, who—aided by a scrolling metronome/monitor in front of the conductor's stand—kept the music on track with only a few missed beats.
Next came the "Three Pieces from Indiana Jones," which opened with the "Scherzo for Motorcycle and Orchestra." That's a sentimental favorite for me, as it was one of the Williams "gateway drugs" on the Greatest Hits 1969-1999 album that took adolescent me from "casual fan" to "casualty of fanaticism." (I actually credit "Scherzo" with awakening me to the power of a well-crafted instrumental piece. It was that track that showed me there was more to John Williams, and film music, and orchestral music, than trumpets and theme songs.) This was the first of several pieces where the precision of the musicians really shone. Pizzicato strings gave way to horn bursts, which led back to bowed string lines and fleeting flute runs without a millisecond of overlap or delay. I also could swear I heard a slight modification to the ending of the piece, but there are already discrepancies between the OST, end credits, and concert versions, so it might just have been one of those that I was less familiar with. The middle piece was "Marion's Theme," in what I assume is the 2008 concert version, because it featured a beautiful and unfamiliar woodwind counter-melody here and there, plus some new transitional material. Bloody gorgeous. He closed the suite with "The Adventures of Mutt," a piece I used to find derivative and boring, but which has grown on me a lot in five years. It sounded positively joyous, and it's got to be one of the Maestro's most fun recent compositions outside of the Tintin score. I was surprised that this suite didn't include the "Raiders March," apart from its quotations in "Mutt," but I was just as happy to get to explore these three underplayed gems. (Still waiting for a recording of "Marion's Theme," aren't we?)
A spoken intro from Williams led to the Lincoln triptych, wherein "Elegy" and "With Malice Toward None" were a sandwich of gorgeous wallpaper. (Sorry, I acknowledge the quality there, but do not combine the Lincoln soundtrack with driving or operating heavy machinery. Also, points lost for excluding "The People's House," which is the belle of that ball in my book.) "Getting Out the Vote," though, which featured concertmaster Robert Chen, was fantastic. What remains a small-ensemble piece of pseudo-source music on the album was rejiggered and (I think) expanded here to let the whole orchestra in on the fun. By the finale, I was tapping my foot and grinning to a piece that had only ever mildly amused me before. This is the kind of arrangement that makes me think Williams could permanently retire tomorrow, and musicians of sufficient caliber would still be able to spend decades finding new and hidden delights in his existing compositions.
He closed out the main program with "Adventures on Earth," a piece I'd only ever dreamed of hearing live someday, and good God, what a marvel. I never knew that those jubilant shrieks that open the concert suite come mainly from the violins. (The woodwinds have to be somewhere in there, too, but I wasn't fast enough with my binoculars to tell for sure.) Every note and beat was spot-on, and this moves me a long way toward naming the climactic moments of E.T. as Williams' absolute zenith in terms of sheer musical majesty and joy. (I felt the same way hearing Erich Kunzel lead the CSO in the shorter E.T. suite at Ravinia some years back.) Incidentally, the Maestro made a point of specifying that the lack of film footage for this piece allowed the orchestra's contribution to the film to really shine, particularly with an ensemble as world-class as the CSO. I couldn't agree more (though, again, it would have been nice to lift the screen out of the way when it wasn't being used so we could see the back players).
That was it for the main program, and honestly, I could have walked out right then and been more than satisfied. But all that flying hadn't quite taken us to another galaxy yet, so a three-part, all-Star Wars encore was in order. Williams led with "Yoda's Theme," which I never expected to hear live—ever, ever, at all, ever—and which brought a huge smile to my face, though I imagine a good chunk of the crowd might have been scratching its collective head. Gorgeous, buttery strings, especially the cellos, dominated this piece. Then came the last surprise of the night: the Star Wars Main Title/End Title suite (no surprise there), accompanied by a fantastic, new-to-me film montage that was, once again, brilliantly edited and synchronized to the music, even in the tiniest of details. (My favorite was a minor cymbal crash that perfectly punctuated a minor onscreen explosion or lightsaber ignition; I forget which.) This beat the tar out of the Lucas/Spielberg montage that Williams was shopping around in 2007, a barely synchronized hodgepodge of famous shots from the original trilogy. This montage, by contrast, gave every major and secondary character a shot at the spotlight, touched on all six films, for better or worse, worked in some comedy, and found ways to reference everything in melodically appropriate places in the music from Episode IV. I had written off film montages as a distraction for those who can't appreciate watching the orchestra; this one really proved me wrong. One more roof-shaking rendition of "The Imperial March," and Williams was ready for his sleepy-time cape routine.
This was an excellent companion piece to the 2007 concert, and while I might have traded a couple of the violin-centered pieces for a fuller exploration of Williams' oeuvre, the crowd-pleasing Shaham section probably compensated for the omission of Superman, Jurassic Park, and the Raiders March. What surprised me, though, was the neglect of Harry Potter. "Hedwig's Theme" is—inarguably, I think—the Maestro's most popular and influential work of the new millennium, considering its impact on the rest of the Potter film-and-theme-park franchise. I would expect that to be a staple nearly as ubiquitous as Star Wars by this point. But I suppose when you show up as often as Williams does in Chicago, you play whatever you're in the mood for on a given weekend. Again, I can't stress enough the professionalism and precision of the CSO. I'm accustomed to hearing lesser orchestras lack this or that in manpower or tempo when it comes to these familiar compositions, but these musicians acquitted themselves beautifully on every selection. Chicago is truly blessed to have an orchestra like the CSO with such close ties to JW. Rock on, Maestro! Keep composing and come back soon!

AMAZING show on Sunday! I saw him with the CSO in 2007, which was much more of a "Greatest Hits" program, I thought, as opposed to the selection of comparatively "deep" tracks he played today. There were a higher proportion of classic crowd-pleasers in '07, but I didn't enjoy this one any less. I was in the upper balcony, and with my trusty pair of binoculars, I had the best seat in the house, with clear views of everyone but the trumpets and some of the percussion, who were camped out behind the screen. (Can't the CSO afford a retractable screen? There's an awfully long donor list in the program...) I'd say the standout section of the ensemble was the trombones, who lit up all the up-tempo selections with bold and melodic lines. I'm an orchestral layperson if ever there were one, so time after time I would sweep my viewfinder from one end of the brass to the other, seeking the source of that righteous racket, and it was almost always the trombones. Big kudos as well to the flute and piccolo players, who popped in and out precisely at the appointed times to dress up or punctuate the big melodies with long or short runs, as well as nailing key solos in the slower material. And of course, the hardest-rocking man on stage, the timpani player, brought every crescendo section over the top.
The program followed what was posted exactly, with the addition of a salute to Hollywood leading ladies set to the theme from Laura, which Gil Shaham stuck around to play as a "personal favor" to the Maestro before the intermission. The encores were the same as reported above, too. The Cowboys overture was a thrilling and energetic opener; I've never heard the full overture live—certainly never under Williams' baton—and it's really a gorgeous, cohesive piece of music, one of those film suites that seems to tell a story in and of itself. The same is even truer of Close Encounters, and speaking as one who's immune to the charms of the film, I loved seeing what amounted to a highlight reel of the movie's few memorable scenes on the projector screen, accompanied by a blessedly short summary of the score's menacing suspense material and a full rendering of its transcendent climax. (I don't use that word loosely, but the ending of that suite really embodies it for me.) Jaws was pleasant, as always, though I'm too young for this to be one of my favorites. (That was, I think, the only outright repeat from 2007 in the main program, and, now as then, I couldn't find the demarcation point between "Out to Sea" and "The Shark Cage Fugue.") I find it curious that, in two concerts, Williams has included selections from this score without touching the concert suite of the main theme (not that I miss it; these pieces are more enjoyable).
Shaham's section was next, and I actually found this section less engaging than the rest, partly because it consisted mostly of non-Williams compositions, and partly because Shaham—a formidable player who really seems to enjoy himself—was a bit poorly amplified. Still, it was a pleasant surprise to hear Williams' orchestral arrangement of "Por Una Cabeza" from Scent of a Woman, which is a treasure I'd only recently unearthed, and the Fiddler medley, which was masterfully arranged, with melodies bouncing all over the orchestra. (I wonder how long it's been since JW conducted that one. I can't imagine it's been at the top of his concert playlists since...well, probably before he gave concerts.) Schindler's List was moving, of course, and quite powerful live (another one I'd never experienced that way). Several concertgoers in my section of the house were moved to a spontaneous standing ovation at the end. This is as good a time as any to note that on every single selection, the CSO was tighter than shrink-wrap. Close your eyes, and they might as well have been blaring the CD versions of any of these selections (with a few pleasant exceptions below).
The Laura starlet montage brought us to the intermission. I always love catching snatches of upcoming selections from rehearsing musicians before and between shows, and I heard a horn player limbering up for "Flight to Neverland" once the musicians started to return. That was the first selection of the second half, another I hadn't heard live from the Maestro, and another knockout. This one featured the flying montage that I've read about before. As it began, I was begrudging the presence of the screen, because it always means lowered lights on the stage and less attention on the musicians. After a minute or so, though, I was won over by the sheer quality of the montage. Someone must have slaved over licensing, sequencing, and synchronizing the clips, which covered a wide swath of decades, studios, and genres. And kudos to Williams and the musicians, who—aided by a scrolling metronome/monitor in front of the conductor's stand—kept the music on track with only a few missed beats.
Next came the "Three Pieces from Indiana Jones," which opened with the "Scherzo for Motorcycle and Orchestra." That's a sentimental favorite for me, as it was one of the Williams "gateway drugs" on the Greatest Hits 1969-1999 album that took adolescent me from "casual fan" to "casualty of fanaticism." (I actually credit "Scherzo" with awakening me to the power of a well-crafted instrumental piece. It was that track that showed me there was more to John Williams, and film music, and orchestral music, than trumpets and theme songs.) This was the first of several pieces where the precision of the musicians really shone. Pizzicato strings gave way to horn bursts, which led back to bowed string lines and fleeting flute runs without a millisecond of overlap or delay. I also could swear I heard a slight modification to the ending of the piece, but there are already discrepancies between the OST, end credits, and concert versions, so it might just have been one of those that I was less familiar with. The middle piece was "Marion's Theme," in what I assume is the 2008 concert version, because it featured a beautiful and unfamiliar woodwind counter-melody here and there, plus some new transitional material. Bloody gorgeous. He closed the suite with "The Adventures of Mutt," a piece I used to find derivative and boring, but which has grown on me a lot in five years. It sounded positively joyous, and it's got to be one of the Maestro's most fun recent compositions outside of the Tintin score. I was surprised that this suite didn't include the "Raiders March," apart from its quotations in "Mutt," but I was just as happy to get to explore these three underplayed gems. (Still waiting for a recording of "Marion's Theme," aren't we?)
A spoken intro from Williams led to the Lincoln triptych, wherein "Elegy" and "With Malice Toward None" were a sandwich of gorgeous wallpaper. (Sorry, I acknowledge the quality there, but do not combine the Lincoln soundtrack with driving or operating heavy machinery. Also, points lost for excluding "The People's House," which is the belle of that ball in my book.) "Getting Out the Vote," though, which featured concertmaster Robert Chen, was fantastic. What remains a small-ensemble piece of pseudo-source music on the album was rejiggered and (I think) expanded here to let the whole orchestra in on the fun. By the finale, I was tapping my foot and grinning to a piece that had only ever mildly amused me before. This is the kind of arrangement that makes me think Williams could permanently retire tomorrow, and musicians of sufficient caliber would still be able to spend decades finding new and hidden delights in his existing compositions.
He closed out the main program with "Adventures on Earth," a piece I'd only ever dreamed of hearing live someday, and good God, what a marvel. I never knew that those jubilant shrieks that open the concert suite come mainly from the violins. (The woodwinds have to be somewhere in there, too, but I wasn't fast enough with my binoculars to tell for sure.) Every note and beat was spot-on, and this moves me a long way toward naming the climactic moments of E.T. as Williams' absolute zenith in terms of sheer musical majesty and joy. (I felt the same way hearing Erich Kunzel lead the CSO in the shorter E.T. suite at Ravinia some years back.) Incidentally, the Maestro made a point of specifying that the lack of film footage for this piece allowed the orchestra's contribution to the film to really shine, particularly with an ensemble as world-class as the CSO. I couldn't agree more (though, again, it would have been nice to lift the screen out of the way when it wasn't being used so we could see the back players).
That was it for the main program, and honestly, I could have walked out right then and been more than satisfied. But all that flying hadn't quite taken us to another galaxy yet, so a three-part, all-Star Wars encore was in order. Williams led with "Yoda's Theme," which I never expected to hear live—ever, ever, at all, ever—and which brought a huge smile to my face, though I imagine a good chunk of the crowd might have been scratching its collective head. Gorgeous, buttery strings, especially the cellos, dominated this piece. Then came the last surprise of the night: the Star Wars Main Title/End Title suite (no surprise there), accompanied by a fantastic, new-to-me film montage that was, once again, brilliantly edited and synchronized to the music, even in the tiniest of details. (My favorite was a minor cymbal crash that perfectly punctuated a minor onscreen explosion or lightsaber ignition; I forget which.) This beat the tar out of the Lucas/Spielberg montage that Williams was shopping around in 2007, a barely synchronized hodgepodge of famous shots from the original trilogy. This montage, by contrast, gave every major and secondary character a shot at the spotlight, touched on all six films, for better or worse, worked in some comedy, and found ways to reference everything in melodically appropriate places in the music from Episode IV. I had written off film montages as a distraction for those who can't appreciate watching the orchestra; this one really proved me wrong. One more roof-shaking rendition of "The Imperial March," and Williams was ready for his sleepy-time cape routine.
This was an excellent companion piece to the 2007 concert, and while I might have traded a couple of the violin-centered pieces for a fuller exploration of Williams' oeuvre, the crowd-pleasing Shaham section probably compensated for the omission of Superman, Jurassic Park, and the Raiders March. What surprised me, though, was the neglect of Harry Potter. "Hedwig's Theme" is—inarguably, I think—the Maestro's most popular and influential work of the new millennium, considering its impact on the rest of the Potter film-and-theme-park franchise. I would expect that to be a staple nearly as ubiquitous as Star Wars by this point. But I suppose when you show up as often as Williams does in Chicago, you play whatever you're in the mood for on a given weekend. Again, I can't stress enough the professionalism and precision of the CSO. I'm accustomed to hearing lesser orchestras lack this or that in manpower or tempo when it comes to these familiar compositions, but these musicians acquitted themselves beautifully on every selection. Chicago is truly blessed to have an orchestra like the CSO with such close ties to JW. Rock on, Maestro! Keep composing and come back soon!

AMAZING show on Sunday! I saw him with the CSO in 2007, which was much more of a "Greatest Hits" program, I thought, as opposed to the selection of comparatively "deep" tracks he played today. There were a higher proportion of classic crowd-pleasers in '07, but I didn't enjoy this one any less. I was in the upper balcony, and with my trusty pair of binoculars, I had the best seat in the house, with clear views of everyone but the trumpets and some of the percussion, who were camped out behind the screen. (Can't the CSO afford a retractable screen? There's an awfully long donor list in the program...) I'd say the standout section of the ensemble was the trombones, who lit up all the up-tempo selections with bold and melodic lines. I'm an orchestral layperson if ever there were one, so time after time I would sweep my viewfinder from one end of the brass to the other, seeking the source of that righteous racket, and it was almost always the trombones. Big kudos as well to the flute and piccolo players, who popped in and out precisely at the appointed times to dress up or punctuate the big melodies with long or short runs, as well as nailing key solos in the slower material. And of course, the hardest-rocking man on stage, the timpani player, brought every crescendo section over the top.
The program followed what was posted exactly, with the addition of a salute to Hollywood leading ladies set to the theme from Laura, which Gil Shaham stuck around to play as a "personal favor" to the Maestro before the intermission. The encores were the same as reported above, too. The Cowboys overture was a thrilling and energetic opener; I've never heard the full overture live—certainly never under Williams' baton—and it's really a gorgeous, cohesive piece of music, one of those film suites that seems to tell a story in and of itself. The same is even truer of Close Encounters, and speaking as one who's immune to the charms of the film, I loved seeing what amounted to a highlight reel of the movie's few memorable scenes on the projector screen, accompanied by a blessedly short summary of the score's menacing suspense material and a full rendering of its transcendent climax. (I don't use that word loosely, but the ending of that suite really embodies it for me.) Jaws was pleasant, as always, though I'm too young for this to be one of my favorites. (That was, I think, the only outright repeat from 2007 in the main program, and, now as then, I couldn't find the demarcation point between "Out to Sea" and "The Shark Cage Fugue.") I find it curious that, in two concerts, Williams has included selections from this score without touching the concert suite of the main theme (not that I miss it; these pieces are more enjoyable).
Shaham's section was next, and I actually found this section less engaging than the rest, partly because it consisted mostly of non-Williams compositions, and partly because Shaham—a formidable player who really seems to enjoy himself—was a bit poorly amplified. Still, it was a pleasant surprise to hear Williams' orchestral arrangement of "Por Una Cabeza" from Scent of a Woman, which is a treasure I'd only recently unearthed, and the Fiddler medley, which was masterfully arranged, with melodies bouncing all over the orchestra. (I wonder how long it's been since JW conducted that one. I can't imagine it's been at the top of his concert playlists since...well, probably before he gave concerts.) Schindler's List was moving, of course, and quite powerful live (another one I'd never experienced that way). Several concertgoers in my section of the house were moved to a spontaneous standing ovation at the end. This is as good a time as any to note that on every single selection, the CSO was tighter than shrink-wrap. Close your eyes, and they might as well have been blaring the CD versions of any of these selections (with a few pleasant exceptions below).
The Laura starlet montage brought us to the intermission. I always love catching snatches of upcoming selections from rehearsing musicians before and between shows, and I heard a horn player limbering up for "Flight to Neverland" once the musicians started to return. That was the first selection of the second half, another I hadn't heard live from the Maestro, and another knockout. This one featured the flying montage that I've read about before. As it began, I was begrudging the presence of the screen, because it always means lowered lights on the stage and less attention on the musicians. After a minute or so, though, I was won over by the sheer quality of the montage. Someone must have slaved over licensing, sequencing, and synchronizing the clips, which covered a wide swath of decades, studios, and genres. And kudos to Williams and the musicians, who—aided by a scrolling metronome/monitor in front of the conductor's stand—kept the music on track with only a few missed beats.
Next came the "Three Pieces from Indiana Jones," which opened with the "Scherzo for Motorcycle and Orchestra." That's a sentimental favorite for me, as it was one of the Williams "gateway drugs" on the Greatest Hits 1969-1999 album that took adolescent me from "casual fan" to "casualty of fanaticism." (I actually credit "Scherzo" with awakening me to the power of a well-crafted instrumental piece. It was that track that showed me there was more to John Williams, and film music, and orchestral music, than trumpets and theme songs.) This was the first of several pieces where the precision of the musicians really shone. Pizzicato strings gave way to horn bursts, which led back to bowed string lines and fleeting flute runs without a millisecond of overlap or delay. I also could swear I heard a slight modification to the ending of the piece, but there are already discrepancies between the OST, end credits, and concert versions, so it might just have been one of those that I was less familiar with. The middle piece was "Marion's Theme," in what I assume is the 2008 concert version, because it featured a beautiful and unfamiliar woodwind counter-melody here and there, plus some new transitional material. Bloody gorgeous. He closed the suite with "The Adventures of Mutt," a piece I used to find derivative and boring, but which has grown on me a lot in five years. It sounded positively joyous, and it's got to be one of the Maestro's most fun recent compositions outside of the Tintin score. I was surprised that this suite didn't include the "Raiders March," apart from its quotations in "Mutt," but I was just as happy to get to explore these three underplayed gems. (Still waiting for a recording of "Marion's Theme," aren't we?)
A spoken intro from Williams led to the Lincoln triptych, wherein "Elegy" and "With Malice Toward None" were a sandwich of gorgeous wallpaper. (Sorry, I acknowledge the quality there, but do not combine the Lincoln soundtrack with driving or operating heavy machinery. Also, points lost for excluding "The People's House," which is the belle of that ball in my book.) "Getting Out the Vote," though, which featured concertmaster Robert Chen, was fantastic. What remains a small-ensemble piece of pseudo-source music on the album was rejiggered and (I think) expanded here to let the whole orchestra in on the fun. By the finale, I was tapping my foot and grinning to a piece that had only ever mildly amused me before. This is the kind of arrangement that makes me think Williams could permanently retire tomorrow, and musicians of sufficient caliber would still be able to spend decades finding new and hidden delights in his existing compositions.
He closed out the main program with "Adventures on Earth," a piece I'd only ever dreamed of hearing live someday, and good God, what a marvel. I never knew that those jubilant shrieks that open the concert suite come mainly from the violins. (The woodwinds have to be somewhere in there, too, but I wasn't fast enough with my binoculars to tell for sure.) Every note and beat was spot-on, and this moves me a long way toward naming the climactic moments of E.T. as Williams' absolute zenith in terms of sheer musical majesty and joy. (I felt the same way hearing Erich Kunzel lead the CSO in the shorter E.T. suite at Ravinia some years back.) Incidentally, the Maestro made a point of specifying that the lack of film footage for this piece allowed the orchestra's contribution to the film to really shine, particularly with an ensemble as world-class as the CSO. I couldn't agree more (though, again, it would have been nice to lift the screen out of the way when it wasn't being used so we could see the back players).
That was it for the main program, and honestly, I could have walked out right then and been more than satisfied. But all that flying hadn't quite taken us to another galaxy yet, so a three-part, all-Star Wars encore was in order. Williams led with "Yoda's Theme," which I never expected to hear live—ever, ever, at all, ever—and which brought a huge smile to my face, though I imagine a good chunk of the crowd might have been scratching its collective head. Gorgeous, buttery strings, especially the cellos, dominated this piece. Then came the last surprise of the night: the Star Wars Main Title/End Title suite (no surprise there), accompanied by a fantastic, new-to-me film montage that was, once again, brilliantly edited and synchronized to the music, even in the tiniest of details. (My favorite was a minor cymbal crash that perfectly punctuated a minor onscreen explosion or lightsaber ignition; I forget which.) This beat the tar out of the Lucas/Spielberg montage that Williams was shopping around in 2007, a barely synchronized hodgepodge of famous shots from the original trilogy. This montage, by contrast, gave every major and secondary character a shot at the spotlight, touched on all six films, for better or worse, worked in some comedy, and found ways to reference everything in melodically appropriate places in the music from Episode IV. I had written off film montages as a distraction for those who can't appreciate watching the orchestra; this one really proved me wrong. One more roof-shaking rendition of "The Imperial March," and Williams was ready for his sleepy-time cape routine.
This was an excellent companion piece to the 2007 concert, and while I might have traded a couple of the violin-centered pieces for a fuller exploration of Williams' oeuvre, the crowd-pleasing Shaham section probably compensated for the omission of Superman, Jurassic Park, and the Raiders March. What surprised me, though, was the neglect of Harry Potter. "Hedwig's Theme" is—inarguably, I think—the Maestro's most popular and influential work of the new millennium, considering its impact on the rest of the Potter film-and-theme-park franchise. I would expect that to be a staple nearly as ubiquitous as Star Wars by this point. But I suppose when you show up as often as Williams does in Chicago, you play whatever you're in the mood for on a given weekend. Again, I can't stress enough the professionalism and precision of the CSO. I'm accustomed to hearing lesser orchestras lack this or that in manpower or tempo when it comes to these familiar compositions, but these musicians acquitted themselves beautifully on every selection. Chicago is truly blessed to have an orchestra like the CSO with such close ties to JW. Rock on, Maestro! Keep composing and come back soon!

AMAZING show on Sunday! I saw him with the CSO in 2007, which was much more of a "Greatest Hits" program, I thought, as opposed to the selection of comparatively "deep" tracks he played today. There were a higher proportion of classic crowd-pleasers in '07, but I didn't enjoy this one any less. I was in the upper balcony, and with my trusty pair of binoculars, I had the best seat in the house, with clear views of everyone but the trumpets and some of the percussion, who were camped out behind the screen. (Can't the CSO afford a retractable screen? There's an awfully long donor list in the program...) I'd say the standout section of the ensemble was the trombones, who lit up all the up-tempo selections with bold and melodic lines. I'm an orchestral layperson if ever there were one, so time after time I would sweep my viewfinder from one end of the brass to the other, seeking the source of that righteous racket, and it was almost always the trombones. Big kudos as well to the flute and piccolo players, who popped in and out precisely at the appointed times to dress up or punctuate the big melodies with long or short runs, as well as nailing key solos in the slower material. And of course, the hardest-rocking man on stage, the timpani player, brought every crescendo section over the top.
The program followed what was posted exactly, with the addition of a salute to Hollywood leading ladies set to the theme from Laura, which Gil Shaham stuck around to play as a "personal favor" to the Maestro before the intermission. The encores were the same as reported above, too. The Cowboys overture was a thrilling and energetic opener; I've never heard the full overture live—certainly never under Williams' baton—and it's really a gorgeous, cohesive piece of music, one of those film suites that seems to tell a story in and of itself. The same is even truer of Close Encounters, and speaking as one who's immune to the charms of the film, I loved seeing what amounted to a highlight reel of the movie's few memorable scenes on the projector screen, accompanied by a blessedly short summary of the score's menacing suspense material and a full rendering of its transcendent climax. (I don't use that word loosely, but the ending of that suite really embodies it for me.) Jaws was pleasant, as always, though I'm too young for this to be one of my favorites. (That was, I think, the only outright repeat from 2007 in the main program, and, now as then, I couldn't find the demarcation point between "Out to Sea" and "The Shark Cage Fugue.") I find it curious that, in two concerts, Williams has included selections from this score without touching the concert suite of the main theme (not that I miss it; these pieces are more enjoyable).
Shaham's section was next, and I actually found this section less engaging than the rest, partly because it consisted mostly of non-Williams compositions, and partly because Shaham—a formidable player who really seems to enjoy himself—was a bit poorly amplified. Still, it was a pleasant surprise to hear Williams' orchestral arrangement of "Por Una Cabeza" from Scent of a Woman, which is a treasure I'd only recently unearthed, and the Fiddler medley, which was masterfully arranged, with melodies bouncing all over the orchestra. (I wonder how long it's been since JW conducted that one. I can't imagine it's been at the top of his concert playlists since...well, probably before he gave concerts.) Schindler's List was moving, of course, and quite powerful live (another one I'd never experienced that way). Several concertgoers in my section of the house were moved to a spontaneous standing ovation at the end. This is as good a time as any to note that on every single selection, the CSO was tighter than shrink-wrap. Close your eyes, and they might as well have been blaring the CD versions of any of these selections (with a few pleasant exceptions below).
The Laura starlet montage brought us to the intermission. I always love catching snatches of upcoming selections from rehearsing musicians before and between shows, and I heard a horn player limbering up for "Flight to Neverland" once the musicians started to return. That was the first selection of the second half, another I hadn't heard live from the Maestro, and another knockout. This one featured the flying montage that I've read about before. As it began, I was begrudging the presence of the screen, because it always means lowered lights on the stage and less attention on the musicians. After a minute or so, though, I was won over by the sheer quality of the montage. Someone must have slaved over licensing, sequencing, and synchronizing the clips, which covered a wide swath of decades, studios, and genres. And kudos to Williams and the musicians, who—aided by a scrolling metronome/monitor in front of the conductor's stand—kept the music on track with only a few missed beats.
Next came the "Three Pieces from Indiana Jones," which opened with the "Scherzo for Motorcycle and Orchestra." That's a sentimental favorite for me, as it was one of the Williams "gateway drugs" on the Greatest Hits 1969-1999 album that took adolescent me from "casual fan" to "casualty of fanaticism." (I actually credit "Scherzo" with awakening me to the power of a well-crafted instrumental piece. It was that track that showed me there was more to John Williams, and film music, and orchestral music, than trumpets and theme songs.) This was the first of several pieces where the precision of the musicians really shone. Pizzicato strings gave way to horn bursts, which led back to bowed string lines and fleeting flute runs without a millisecond of overlap or delay. I also could swear I heard a slight modification to the ending of the piece, but there are already discrepancies between the OST, end credits, and concert versions, so it might just have been one of those that I was less familiar with. The middle piece was "Marion's Theme," in what I assume is the 2008 concert version, because it featured a beautiful and unfamiliar woodwind counter-melody here and there, plus some new transitional material. Bloody gorgeous. He closed the suite with "The Adventures of Mutt," a piece I used to find derivative and boring, but which has grown on me a lot in five years. It sounded positively joyous, and it's got to be one of the Maestro's most fun recent compositions outside of the Tintin score. I was surprised that this suite didn't include the "Raiders March," apart from its quotations in "Mutt," but I was just as happy to get to explore these three underplayed gems. (Still waiting for a recording of "Marion's Theme," aren't we?)
A spoken intro from Williams led to the Lincoln triptych, wherein "Elegy" and "With Malice Toward None" were a sandwich of gorgeous wallpaper. (Sorry, I acknowledge the quality there, but do not combine the Lincoln soundtrack with driving or operating heavy machinery. Also, points lost for excluding "The People's House," which is the belle of that ball in my book.) "Getting Out the Vote," though, which featured concertmaster Robert Chen, was fantastic. What remains a small-ensemble piece of pseudo-source music on the album was rejiggered and (I think) expanded here to let the whole orchestra in on the fun. By the finale, I was tapping my foot and grinning to a piece that had only ever mildly amused me before. This is the kind of arrangement that makes me think Williams could permanently retire tomorrow, and musicians of sufficient caliber would still be able to spend decades finding new and hidden delights in his existing compositions.
He closed out the main program with "Adventures on Earth," a piece I'd only ever dreamed of hearing live someday, and good God, what a marvel. I never knew that those jubilant shrieks that open the concert suite come mainly from the violins. (The woodwinds have to be somewhere in there, too, but I wasn't fast enough with my binoculars to tell for sure.) Every note and beat was spot-on, and this moves me a long way toward naming the climactic moments of E.T. as Williams' absolute zenith in terms of sheer musical majesty and joy. (I felt the same way hearing Erich Kunzel lead the CSO in the shorter E.T. suite at Ravinia some years back.) Incidentally, the Maestro made a point of specifying that the lack of film footage for this piece allowed the orchestra's contribution to the film to really shine, particularly with an ensemble as world-class as the CSO. I couldn't agree more (though, again, it would have been nice to lift the screen out of the way when it wasn't being used so we could see the back players).
That was it for the main program, and honestly, I could have walked out right then and been more than satisfied. But all that flying hadn't quite taken us to another galaxy yet, so a three-part, all-Star Wars encore was in order. Williams led with "Yoda's Theme," which I never expected to hear live—ever, ever, at all, ever—and which brought a huge smile to my face, though I imagine a good chunk of the crowd might have been scratching its collective head. Gorgeous, buttery strings, especially the cellos, dominated this piece. Then came the last surprise of the night: the Star Wars Main Title/End Title suite (no surprise there), accompanied by a fantastic, new-to-me film montage that was, once again, brilliantly edited and synchronized to the music, even in the tiniest of details. (My favorite was a minor cymbal crash that perfectly punctuated a minor onscreen explosion or lightsaber ignition; I forget which.) This beat the tar out of the Lucas/Spielberg montage that Williams was shopping around in 2007, a barely synchronized hodgepodge of famous shots from the original trilogy. This montage, by contrast, gave every major and secondary character a shot at the spotlight, touched on all six films, for better or worse, worked in some comedy, and found ways to reference everything in melodically appropriate places in the music from Episode IV. I had written off film montages as a distraction for those who can't appreciate watching the orchestra; this one really proved me wrong. One more roof-shaking rendition of "The Imperial March," and Williams was ready for his sleepy-time cape routine.
This was an excellent companion piece to the 2007 concert, and while I might have traded a couple of the violin-centered pieces for a fuller exploration of Williams' oeuvre, the crowd-pleasing Shaham section probably compensated for the omission of Superman, Jurassic Park, and the Raiders March. What surprised me, though, was the neglect of Harry Potter. "Hedwig's Theme" is—inarguably, I think—the Maestro's most popular and influential work of the new millennium, considering its impact on the rest of the Potter film-and-theme-park franchise. I would expect that to be a staple nearly as ubiquitous as Star Wars by this point. But I suppose when you show up as often as Williams does in Chicago, you play whatever you're in the mood for on a given weekend. Again, I can't stress enough the professionalism and precision of the CSO. I'm accustomed to hearing lesser orchestras lack this or that in manpower or tempo when it comes to these familiar compositions, but these musicians acquitted themselves beautifully on every selection. Chicago is truly blessed to have an orchestra like the CSO with such close ties to JW. Rock on, Maestro! Keep composing and come back soon!

AMAZING show on Sunday! I saw him with the CSO in 2007, which was much more of a "Greatest Hits" program, I thought, as opposed to the selection of comparatively "deep" tracks he played today. There were a higher proportion of classic crowd-pleasers in '07, but I didn't enjoy this one any less. I was in the upper balcony, and with my trusty pair of binoculars, I had the best seat in the house, with clear views of everyone but the trumpets and some of the percussion, who were camped out behind the screen. (Can't the CSO afford a retractable screen? There's an awfully long donor list in the program...) I'd say the standout section of the ensemble was the trombones, who lit up all the up-tempo selections with bold and melodic lines. I'm an orchestral layperson if ever there were one, so time after time I would sweep my viewfinder from one end of the brass to the other, seeking the source of that righteous racket, and it was almost always the trombones. Big kudos as well to the flute and piccolo players, who popped in and out precisely at the appointed times to dress up or punctuate the big melodies with long or short runs, as well as nailing key solos in the slower material. And of course, the hardest-rocking man on stage, the timpani player, brought every crescendo section over the top.
The program followed what was posted exactly, with the addition of a salute to Hollywood leading ladies set to the theme from Laura, which Gil Shaham stuck around to play as a "personal favor" to the Maestro before the intermission. The encores were the same as reported above, too. The Cowboys overture was a thrilling and energetic opener; I've never heard the full overture live—certainly never under Williams' baton—and it's really a gorgeous, cohesive piece of music, one of those film suites that seems to tell a story in and of itself. The same is even truer of Close Encounters, and speaking as one who's immune to the charms of the film, I loved seeing what amounted to a highlight reel of the movie's few memorable scenes on the projector screen, accompanied by a blessedly short summary of the score's menacing suspense material and a full rendering of its transcendent climax. (I don't use that word loosely, but the ending of that suite really embodies it for me.) Jaws was pleasant, as always, though I'm too young for this to be one of my favorites. (That was, I think, the only outright repeat from 2007 in the main program, and, now as then, I couldn't find the demarcation point between "Out to Sea" and "The Shark Cage Fugue.") I find it curious that, in two concerts, Williams has included selections from this score without touching the concert suite of the main theme (not that I miss it; these pieces are more enjoyable).
Shaham's section was next, and I actually found this section less engaging than the rest, partly because it consisted mostly of non-Williams compositions, and partly because Shaham—a formidable player who really seems to enjoy himself—was a bit poorly amplified. Still, it was a pleasant surprise to hear Williams' orchestral arrangement of "Por Una Cabeza" from Scent of a Woman, which is a treasure I'd only recently unearthed, and the Fiddler medley, which was masterfully arranged, with melodies bouncing all over the orchestra. (I wonder how long it's been since JW conducted that one. I can't imagine it's been at the top of his concert playlists since...well, probably before he gave concerts.) Schindler's List was moving, of course, and quite powerful live (another one I'd never experienced that way). Several concertgoers in my section of the house were moved to a spontaneous standing ovation at the end. This is as good a time as any to note that on every single selection, the CSO was tighter than shrink-wrap. Close your eyes, and they might as well have been blaring the CD versions of any of these selections (with a few pleasant exceptions below).
The Laura starlet montage brought us to the intermission. I always love catching snatches of upcoming selections from rehearsing musicians before and between shows, and I heard a horn player limbering up for "Flight to Neverland" once the musicians started to return. That was the first selection of the second half, another I hadn't heard live from the Maestro, and another knockout. This one featured the flying montage that I've read about before. As it began, I was begrudging the presence of the screen, because it always means lowered lights on the stage and less attention on the musicians. After a minute or so, though, I was won over by the sheer quality of the montage. Someone must have slaved over licensing, sequencing, and synchronizing the clips, which covered a wide swath of decades, studios, and genres. And kudos to Williams and the musicians, who—aided by a scrolling metronome/monitor in front of the conductor's stand—kept the music on track with only a few missed beats.
Next came the "Three Pieces from Indiana Jones," which opened with the "Scherzo for Motorcycle and Orchestra." That's a sentimental favorite for me, as it was one of the Williams "gateway drugs" on the Greatest Hits 1969-1999 album that took adolescent me from "casual fan" to "casualty of fanaticism." (I actually credit "Scherzo" with awakening me to the power of a well-crafted instrumental piece. It was that track that showed me there was more to John Williams, and film music, and orchestral music, than trumpets and theme songs.) This was the first of several pieces where the precision of the musicians really shone. Pizzicato strings gave way to horn bursts, which led back to bowed string lines and fleeting flute runs without a millisecond of overlap or delay. I also could swear I heard a slight modification to the ending of the piece, but there are already discrepancies between the OST, end credits, and concert versions, so it might just have been one of those that I was less familiar with. The middle piece was "Marion's Theme," in what I assume is the 2008 concert version, because it featured a beautiful and unfamiliar woodwind counter-melody here and there, plus some new transitional material. Bloody gorgeous. He closed the suite with "The Adventures of Mutt," a piece I used to find derivative and boring, but which has grown on me a lot in five years. It sounded positively joyous, and it's got to be one of the Maestro's most fun recent compositions outside of the Tintin score. I was surprised that this suite didn't include the "Raiders March," apart from its quotations in "Mutt," but I was just as happy to get to explore these three underplayed gems. (Still waiting for a recording of "Marion's Theme," aren't we?)
A spoken intro from Williams led to the Lincoln triptych, wherein "Elegy" and "With Malice Toward None" were a sandwich of gorgeous wallpaper. (Sorry, I acknowledge the quality there, but do not combine the Lincoln soundtrack with driving or operating heavy machinery. Also, points lost for excluding "The People's House," which is the belle of that ball in my book.) "Getting Out the Vote," though, which featured concertmaster Robert Chen, was fantastic. What remains a small-ensemble piece of pseudo-source music on the album was rejiggered and (I think) expanded here to let the whole orchestra in on the fun. By the finale, I was tapping my foot and grinning to a piece that had only ever mildly amused me before. This is the kind of arrangement that makes me think Williams could permanently retire tomorrow, and musicians of sufficient caliber would still be able to spend decades finding new and hidden delights in his existing compositions.
He closed out the main program with "Adventures on Earth," a piece I'd only ever dreamed of hearing live someday, and good God, what a marvel. I never knew that those jubilant shrieks that open the concert suite come mainly from the violins. (The woodwinds have to be somewhere in there, too, but I wasn't fast enough with my binoculars to tell for sure.) Every note and beat was spot-on, and this moves me a long way toward naming the climactic moments of E.T. as Williams' absolute zenith in terms of sheer musical majesty and joy. (I felt the same way hearing Erich Kunzel lead the CSO in the shorter E.T. suite at Ravinia some years back.) Incidentally, the Maestro made a point of specifying that the lack of film footage for this piece allowed the orchestra's contribution to the film to really shine, particularly with an ensemble as world-class as the CSO. I couldn't agree more (though, again, it would have been nice to lift the screen out of the way when it wasn't being used so we could see the back players).
That was it for the main program, and honestly, I could have walked out right then and been more than satisfied. But all that flying hadn't quite taken us to another galaxy yet, so a three-part, all-Star Wars encore was in order. Williams led with "Yoda's Theme," which I never expected to hear live—ever, ever, at all, ever—and which brought a huge smile to my face, though I imagine a good chunk of the crowd might have been scratching its collective head. Gorgeous, buttery strings, especially the cellos, dominated this piece. Then came the last surprise of the night: the Star Wars Main Title/End Title suite (no surprise there), accompanied by a fantastic, new-to-me film montage that was, once again, brilliantly edited and synchronized to the music, even in the tiniest of details. (My favorite was a minor cymbal crash that perfectly punctuated a minor onscreen explosion or lightsaber ignition; I forget which.) This beat the tar out of the Lucas/Spielberg montage that Williams was shopping around in 2007, a barely synchronized hodgepodge of famous shots from the original trilogy. This montage, by contrast, gave every major and secondary character a shot at the spotlight, touched on all six films, for better or worse, worked in some comedy, and found ways to reference everything in melodically appropriate places in the music from Episode IV. I had written off film montages as a distraction for those who can't appreciate watching the orchestra; this one really proved me wrong. One more roof-shaking rendition of "The Imperial March," and Williams was ready for his sleepy-time cape routine.
This was an excellent companion piece to the 2007 concert, and while I might have traded a couple of the violin-centered pieces for a fuller exploration of Williams' oeuvre, the crowd-pleasing Shaham section probably compensated for the omission of Superman, Jurassic Park, and the Raiders March. What surprised me, though, was the neglect of Harry Potter. "Hedwig's Theme" is—inarguably, I think—the Maestro's most popular and influential work of the new millennium, considering its impact on the rest of the Potter film-and-theme-park franchise. I would expect that to be a staple nearly as ubiquitous as Star Wars by this point. But I suppose when you show up as often as Williams does in Chicago, you play whatever you're in the mood for on a given weekend. Again, I can't stress enough the professionalism and precision of the CSO. I'm accustomed to hearing lesser orchestras lack this or that in manpower or tempo when it comes to these familiar compositions, but these musicians acquitted themselves beautifully on every selection. Chicago is truly blessed to have an orchestra like the CSO with such close ties to JW. Rock on, Maestro! Keep composing and come back soon!

AMAZING show on Sunday! I saw him with the CSO in 2007, which was much more of a "Greatest Hits" program, I thought, as opposed to the selection of comparatively "deep" tracks he played today. There were a higher proportion of classic crowd-pleasers in '07, but I didn't enjoy this one any less. I was in the upper balcony, and with my trusty pair of binoculars, I had the best seat in the house, with clear views of everyone but the trumpets and some of the percussion, who were camped out behind the screen. (Can't the CSO afford a retractable screen? There's an awfully long donor list in the program...) I'd say the standout section of the ensemble was the trombones, who lit up all the up-tempo selections with bold and melodic lines. I'm an orchestral layperson if ever there were one, so time after time I would sweep my viewfinder from one end of the brass to the other, seeking the source of that righteous racket, and it was almost always the trombones. Big kudos as well to the flute and piccolo players, who popped in and out precisely at the appointed times to dress up or punctuate the big melodies with long or short runs, as well as nailing key solos in the slower material. And of course, the hardest-rocking man on stage, the timpani player, brought every crescendo section over the top.
The program followed what was posted exactly, with the addition of a salute to Hollywood leading ladies set to the theme from Laura, which Gil Shaham stuck around to play as a "personal favor" to the Maestro before the intermission. The encores were the same as reported above, too. The Cowboys overture was a thrilling and energetic opener; I've never heard the full overture live—certainly never under Williams' baton—and it's really a gorgeous, cohesive piece of music, one of those film suites that seems to tell a story in and of itself. The same is even truer of Close Encounters, and speaking as one who's immune to the charms of the film, I loved seeing what amounted to a highlight reel of the movie's few memorable scenes on the projector screen, accompanied by a blessedly short summary of the score's menacing suspense material and a full rendering of its transcendent climax. (I don't use that word loosely, but the ending of that suite really embodies it for me.) Jaws was pleasant, as always, though I'm too young for this to be one of my favorites. (That was, I think, the only outright repeat from 2007 in the main program, and, now as then, I couldn't find the demarcation point between "Out to Sea" and "The Shark Cage Fugue.") I find it curious that, in two concerts, Williams has included selections from this score without touching the concert suite of the main theme (not that I miss it; these pieces are more enjoyable).
Shaham's section was next, and I actually found this section less engaging than the rest, partly because it consisted mostly of non-Williams compositions, and partly because Shaham—a formidable player who really seems to enjoy himself—was a bit poorly amplified. Still, it was a pleasant surprise to hear Williams' orchestral arrangement of "Por Una Cabeza" from Scent of a Woman, which is a treasure I'd only recently unearthed, and the Fiddler medley, which was masterfully arranged, with melodies bouncing all over the orchestra. (I wonder how long it's been since JW conducted that one. I can't imagine it's been at the top of his concert playlists since...well, probably before he gave concerts.) Schindler's List was moving, of course, and quite powerful live (another one I'd never experienced that way). Several concertgoers in my section of the house were moved to a spontaneous standing ovation at the end. This is as good a time as any to note that on every single selection, the CSO was tighter than shrink-wrap. Close your eyes, and they might as well have been blaring the CD versions of any of these selections (with a few pleasant exceptions below).
The Laura starlet montage brought us to the intermission. I always love catching snatches of upcoming selections from rehearsing musicians before and between shows, and I heard a horn player limbering up for "Flight to Neverland" once the musicians started to return. That was the first selection of the second half, another I hadn't heard live from the Maestro, and another knockout. This one featured the flying montage that I've read about before. As it began, I was begrudging the presence of the screen, because it always means lowered lights on the stage and less attention on the musicians. After a minute or so, though, I was won over by the sheer quality of the montage. Someone must have slaved over licensing, sequencing, and synchronizing the clips, which covered a wide swath of decades, studios, and genres. And kudos to Williams and the musicians, who—aided by a scrolling metronome/monitor in front of the conductor's stand—kept the music on track with only a few missed beats.
Next came the "Three Pieces from Indiana Jones," which opened with the "Scherzo for Motorcycle and Orchestra." That's a sentimental favorite for me, as it was one of the Williams "gateway drugs" on the Greatest Hits 1969-1999 album that took adolescent me from "casual fan" to "casualty of fanaticism." (I actually credit "Scherzo" with awakening me to the power of a well-crafted instrumental piece. It was that track that showed me there was more to John Williams, and film music, and orchestral music, than trumpets and theme songs.) This was the first of several pieces where the precision of the musicians really shone. Pizzicato strings gave way to horn bursts, which led back to bowed string lines and fleeting flute runs without a millisecond of overlap or delay. I also could swear I heard a slight modification to the ending of the piece, but there are already discrepancies between the OST, end credits, and concert versions, so it might just have been one of those that I was less familiar with. The middle piece was "Marion's Theme," in what I assume is the 2008 concert version, because it featured a beautiful and unfamiliar woodwind counter-melody here and there, plus some new transitional material. Bloody gorgeous. He closed the suite with "The Adventures of Mutt," a piece I used to find derivative and boring, but which has grown on me a lot in five years. It sounded positively joyous, and it's got to be one of the Maestro's most fun recent compositions outside of the Tintin score. I was surprised that this suite didn't include the "Raiders March," apart from its quotations in "Mutt," but I was just as happy to get to explore these three underplayed gems. (Still waiting for a recording of "Marion's Theme," aren't we?)
A spoken intro from Williams led to the Lincoln triptych, wherein "Elegy" and "With Malice Toward None" were a sandwich of gorgeous wallpaper. (Sorry, I acknowledge the quality there, but do not combine the Lincoln soundtrack with driving or operating heavy machinery. Also, points lost for excluding "The People's House," which is the belle of that ball in my book.) "Getting Out the Vote," though, which featured concertmaster Robert Chen, was fantastic. What remains a small-ensemble piece of pseudo-source music on the album was rejiggered and (I think) expanded here to let the whole orchestra in on the fun. By the finale, I was tapping my foot and grinning to a piece that had only ever mildly amused me before. This is the kind of arrangement that makes me think Williams could permanently retire tomorrow, and musicians of sufficient caliber would still be able to spend decades finding new and hidden delights in his existing compositions.
He closed out the main program with "Adventures on Earth," a piece I'd only ever dreamed of hearing live someday, and good God, what a marvel. I never knew that those jubilant shrieks that open the concert suite come mainly from the violins. (The woodwinds have to be somewhere in there, too, but I wasn't fast enough with my binoculars to tell for sure.) Every note and beat was spot-on, and this moves me a long way toward naming the climactic moments of E.T. as Williams' absolute zenith in terms of sheer musical majesty and joy. (I felt the same way hearing Erich Kunzel lead the CSO in the shorter E.T. suite at Ravinia some years back.) Incidentally, the Maestro made a point of specifying that the lack of film footage for this piece allowed the orchestra's contribution to the film to really shine, particularly with an ensemble as world-class as the CSO. I couldn't agree more (though, again, it would have been nice to lift the screen out of the way when it wasn't being used so we could see the back players).
That was it for the main program, and honestly, I could have walked out right then and been more than satisfied. But all that flying hadn't quite taken us to another galaxy yet, so a three-part, all-Star Wars encore was in order. Williams led with "Yoda's Theme," which I never expected to hear live—ever, ever, at all, ever—and which brought a huge smile to my face, though I imagine a good chunk of the crowd might have been scratching its collective head. Gorgeous, buttery strings, especially the cellos, dominated this piece. Then came the last surprise of the night: the Star Wars Main Title/End Title suite (no surprise there), accompanied by a fantastic, new-to-me film montage that was, once again, brilliantly edited and synchronized to the music, even in the tiniest of details. (My favorite was a minor cymbal crash that perfectly punctuated a minor onscreen explosion or lightsaber ignition; I forget which.) This beat the tar out of the Lucas/Spielberg montage that Williams was shopping around in 2007, a barely synchronized hodgepodge of famous shots from the original trilogy. This montage, by contrast, gave every major and secondary character a shot at the spotlight, touched on all six films, for better or worse, worked in some comedy, and found ways to reference everything in melodically appropriate places in the music from Episode IV. I had written off film montages as a distraction for those who can't appreciate watching the orchestra; this one really proved me wrong. One more roof-shaking rendition of "The Imperial March," and Williams was ready for his sleepy-time cape routine.
This was an excellent companion piece to the 2007 concert, and while I might have traded a couple of the violin-centered pieces for a fuller exploration of Williams' oeuvre, the crowd-pleasing Shaham section probably compensated for the omission of Superman, Jurassic Park, and the Raiders March. What surprised me, though, was the neglect of Harry Potter. "Hedwig's Theme" is—inarguably, I think—the Maestro's most popular and influential work of the new millennium, considering its impact on the rest of the Potter film-and-theme-park franchise. I would expect that to be a staple nearly as ubiquitous as Star Wars by this point. But I suppose when you show up as often as Williams does in Chicago, you play whatever you're in the mood for on a given weekend. Again, I can't stress enough the professionalism and precision of the CSO. I'm accustomed to hearing lesser orchestras lack this or that in manpower or tempo when it comes to these familiar compositions, but these musicians acquitted themselves beautifully on every selection. Chicago is truly blessed to have an orchestra like the CSO with such close ties to JW. Rock on, Maestro! Keep composing and come back soon!