TownerFan

Considering that Williams is composing 40 minutes worth of listening, I'm pretty sure that the soundtrack CD will be almost an all-John Williams affair. Surely he'll write some concert-rounded pieces and themes and maybe he will record it as a special symphonic suite. Williams Ross will probably tackle the more generic underscoring cues and he will be represented with two or three cuts on the CD. Maurizio --

So he could ask him something about the AOTC scoring sessions!! Morn, discover the truth! The JW community will be grateful to you! About all this Harry Potter/Williams Ross fuss... I think it has to do with a conflicting schedule problem. In the Dyer interview, Williams said also that he began composing the score even though the movie is STILL on the filming stage. Probably, he wants to dedicate more time to the new Spielberg film and to his concert works. And if Williams has not a problem about giving to someone else the main scoring duties, I think the situation is under control. Maurizio --

Here it is: http://mixonline.com/ar/audio_star_wars_ep...ode_2/index.htm I read it and I found it very interesting and deeply informative, although specifically techical for the most part (i.e.: you have to be a sound technician to undertand a lot of things!) They talk also about music and there are some interesting infos. Here's some bits: So... it sounds (excuse the pun) like Ben Burtt and John Williams look and hear at the movie in a pretty different way... Let's start the comments! Maurizio --

Found the article! Here it is: http://mixonline.com/ar/audio_star_wars_ep...ode_2/index.htm Now I'll read it... Maurizio --

Mm, sounds interesting. Are there other hints about music in that article? If someone knows if exists a weblink of the Mix Magazine, please post it here! Maurizio --

Where did you read that? Mm, I never thinked about it that way... but it could be. Maybe Lucas wanted to give to the big battle a sort of "SAVING PRIVATE RYAN-esque" feel, thinking that putting music would have rendered the scenes too much "heroic" for the nature of the movie. But in the end, he noticed that maybe it was too hard and the scenes didn't worked without music. Probably he noticed it too late in the game, so John Williams didn't have the time to write and record properly composed music for those scenes. So, he and Lucas agreed to re-use music form the previous film, also because there's NO battle music in AOTC... the "Chase Through Coruscant", "Bounty Hunter Pursuit" and "Jango's Escape" cues wouldn't have worked in the battle scenes and considering that there aren't other action cues the only thing to do was to re-track battle music from Ep1, which is stylistically similar to AOTC. Putting music from the Classic Trilogy would have been too much distracting, I think. This is pure speculation, of course... Lord Maurizio --

NOOO!!! Pllleeeeaaaassseee!!!!!!!!! Not Big Fat Luciano!!!!!! I laughed a lot when I knew that some americans call the tenor "Vincerotti" and laughed even more when some time ago, on Movie Music Message Board, I found a topic titled "Il Ciccione canta Nino Rota" (which in Italian means "The Fat Sings Nino Rota"). I'm not taking you around... I don't like Pavarotti and I found exhilarating that kind of comments... here in Italy he is now considered a kind of "popstar" on the level of the Spice Girls and Britney Spears... Maurizio --

I'm listening now to Vaughan Williams' stupendous Sinfonia Antarctica... which has some passages that recalls Attack of the Clones, especially the soprano solos and the ascent/descendent chords (which recalls me also parts of Goldsmith's STAR TREK:TMP). Check it out, it's a beautiful composition. Regarding the great Edward Elgar, I recommend also his superb In the South symphonic overture, a very Williams-esque piece. BTW, JW has said various times that Elgar is his favourite composer... and it's easy to understand why Maurizio -- "Landscape: Lento" from Ralph Vaughan Williams' Sinfonia Antartica (very "starwars-eque"!)

About the DOTF quote: I agree that probably Williams intepreted that theme as a "predestination", as Anakin is going toward his destiny... but is even probable that Lucas wanted THAT theme in that moment... I found stranger the use of the Trade Federation March when Obi-Wan sees the Clone Army marching on. I'm still wondering why Williams used that theme, apparently out of place, in that moment. Well, it works pefectly with the images anyway! On a general note we have to say also that John Williams uses the leitmotif technique in a very simple way, not as strictly intellectual or programmatic as Wagner, for example. Williams uses his themes in a very flexible way, trying to find out the BEST possible usage in a cinematic sense. He helps to carry on the narration and telling the story, which is his FIRST directive. Maurizio -- Ralph Vaughan Williams, Sinfonia Antarctica (some passages are very close-related with Williams' AOTC score... really!)

Well, considering that the movie will hit theater in less than a month, I'm pretty sure Williams has already recorded the score. I don't find the miss of infos about MR that much strange... Spielberg probably wanted a very tight control over any news spreading out about the film. Yes, I know it's a bit strange, because in the internet era we want to know *everything* NOW... Well, look at it in a positive way... maybe we'll have some very big surprise while watching the movie and listening to the CD. I'm sure they'll amaze us one more time! Maurizio -- Ralph Vaughan Williams Sinfonia Antarctica

That reports came from none other than Rick McCallum, the prequels' producer. It's my belief too. It's a very strange thing, btw. Maybe they haven't booked enough LSO sessions to record ALL the music they needed... and then Williams had to run away because he HAD to begin scoring duties on MINORITY REPORT. So he and Lucas decided to go with re-tracking cues from TPM. Other sources claim also that Lucas let to Ken Wannberg the music editing duties... remember that Wannberg is Williams' trusty collaborator since 1967, so Willliams IS probably aware on what happened. It would be nice to hear something about it directly from Ken Wannberg... My guess now is: could Williams and Lucad go back to those scenes and complete them for the DVD?? It would be very nice! Howard Shore has composed and recorded new music for the lenghtier cut of LOTR especially for the DVD... so Williams and Lucas could do the same with Episode II. Well, this is my hope! For what concern us... let's start a petition for the Ultimate Edition! Maurizio --

Another thought about all the messy edits: I think the only "accessibile" people who could try to explain this mystery and tell us what really happened at the scoring sessions are the players of LSO who performed on the soundtrack... and Ken Wannberg, the trusty music editor of John Williams since 1967!! Let's someone interview him!! Maurizio --

VERY GREAT JOB, John!! Only a minor quibble: didn't you notice the music underscoring the walk of Anakin and Padmè through Seville... ehm, Naboo Place? It's right after the end of Yoda and the Younglings. It has a very Spanish flavour and it's really nice. Otherwise, about the tracking of many TPM cues... I'm pretty convinced more and more that Williams REALLY didn't recorded anything for the big final battle on Geonosis. Well, he surely composed something, but didn't recorded the actual cues. Why? Well, I'll try to explain my theory: 1) ALL the battle sequences are scored ONLY with TPM action cues... too many, IMO. We didn't hear ANYTHING newly composed in those scenes, even two or three seconds. And mostly we didn't hear anything on the CD. Notice that original music in the movie reprise when Dooku escapes with his "motorcycle"... and that music IS on the CD. 2) Those sequences were the most complicated and effects-laden and probably they weren't finished yet in January 2002, when JW recorded the music. Probably he didn't have too much clue on what were the exact timings, the sync points, all the things he HAS to know before recording the cues... and Lucas was probably still editing and fixing that big chunk of the movie. So... probably, instead of recording something that in the end would have finished chopped up or unnecessary, Williams and Lucas preferred to go with tracking music from the previous film (which is, btw, stylistically similar to AOTC). I think they both agreed on this thing. It's almost impossibile that Lucas went crazy in that way WITHOUT consulting the Maestro. SURE, Williams wasn't happy with this... but maybe he had to accept it, because of time constraints and priorities. I really think that January was TOO EARLY to record the soundtrack. 3) And there's also the matter of the worldwide release. I know for sure, Skywalker Sound mixers really went crazy to finish MORE THAN 70 versions of the film. And probably this affected the treatment of the music. The edits in the conveyor belt sequence are horrible... Maurizio --