Whatever happened to those big, yet inconsequential musical flourishes of yesteryear?

[Quintus 5,391]

Moments like this. I know why we don't get moments like that in the film scores of today, but that doesn't mean I have to stop moaning about the fact that we may never hear anything like it again.

Little moments like that are what make arm hairs stand on end and I'll be damned if they are quickly forgotten whilst I'm still listening to film music.

[Ollie 859]

Well you can thank people like Jerry Bruckhiemer and a whole slew of other directors and producers who think music is someone pounding away on a keyboard for 80-90 minutes.

[MissPadmé 17]

Well as long as I have these golden moments on CD.. I don't complain, noone can take that from me

and this part.. It is just my favourite out of that score.. I can imagine George Lucas sitting in the rcording tudio in 1977 and listening and watching this music and thinking "Damn.. how can thsi be sooo good? The movie doesn't look crappy anymore!!"

[Quintus 5,391]

I wonder, If Lucas had came along at the same time as Bruckhiemer and Co. if he too would have skipped over a talent like JW in favour of a more affordable and easily manufactured sound, as so often sorely heard today.

[Ollie 859]

Well he might have more easily influenced to take the Kubrick method of scoring ala 2001.

[Morlock 9]

I miss those too. There are some composers who still have those occaisionally. Shore, on some of his bigger scores. Desplat does have moments. But I know what you're saying. That's one of the main things I miss about the 70's-80's. The moments grabbed my attention almost as much as the themes and set-pieces.

BTW: Love the Thomas Newman piece you've got on youtube. Never heard The Lost Boys.

[Taikomochi 783]

I wonder, If Lucas had came along at the same time as Bruckhiemer and Co. if he too would have skipped over a talent like JW in favour of a more affordable and easily manufactured sound, as so often sorely heard today.

Doubtful. Lucas has always cared about an authentic score. That's the reason he met up with JW, after begging Spielberg to suggest a talented composer.

[indy4 152]

I love these moments in "The Destruction of Krypton."

[pixie_twinkle 44]

That really is a great moment.

[BLUMENKOHL 1,064]

That is the greatest moment of film music history.

P.S. We got a great one in Speed Racer ( listen to the beginning of Vroom and Board!)

[Unlucky Bastard 7,765]

What's worse is audiences actually like that crappy Bruckheimer sound.

[AC1 3,565]

It's too old-fashioned, too romantic for most films. It's great!

[Mr. Breathmask 480]

I just realized, if they'd do a piece like that today, they'd add a choir.

Just to make it sound "more epic." <_<

[Unlucky Bastard 7,765]

People love choirs these days. Just go to the Jedi Council forums, they pretty much just like "Duel of the Fates".

[BLUMENKOHL 1,064]

Of course people are going to like something that connects with them more than any other instrument.

You can't call them idiots for that. The human voice is meant to attract humans.

[Unlucky Bastard 7,765]

Like a siren, eh?

[Vaderbait1 1]

Human voices in a choir never attracted me. Choir usually sounds over dramatic and cheesy.

[Taikomochi 783]

I just realized, if they'd do a piece like that today, they'd add a choir.

Just to make it sound "more epic."

*points finger at 300*

And I'd like to say I think the choir rarely works, save fore Williams's uses, of course.

[John Crichton 4]

Other composers can use it effectively too. Nobou Uemastu has written some of the best choral pieces I have ever heard, and there are some great choral parts in LotR (although there's a bit too much in the scores as a whole IMO). But it is tricky to get right.

[Romão 1,931]

Goldenthal writes marvelously for Choir

[Delorean90 32]

Human voices in a choir never attracted me. Choir usually sounds over dramatic and cheesy.

You'd rather have a synth choir?

[Red 73]

Choirs are most definitely overused (painfully so), but in the right circumstances they can be very powerful. JW is probably one of the best to utilize choirs, at least most of the time.

[Delorean90 32]

Something I've noticed is that the usage of choirs often seems to have a different thing going on now than it did in Williams's golden age. Listen to something like "The Map Room: Dawn" or "Opening Credits/The Seance." I haven't heard choir used that way in any recent scores. Is that a particular way of writing, is it the harmonization, is it the recording, or a combination of some of those factors that make it sound like that?

[Jacob 0]

Choirs are most definitely overused (painfully so), but in the right circumstances they can be very powerful. JW is probably one of the best to utilize choirs, at least most of the time.

Yes. I especially like it's use in "The Bridge" from Temple of Doom. I don't think choir is used at any other point in the film and that moment is made all the more powerful for it.

[Delorean90 32]

"Stealing the Stones" has wonderful choir, and yet another example of that different choir sound.

[Henry B 49]

I'm going to take a somewhat divergent opinion here and say that the old-fashioned, Romantic sound is not always superior to the MV sound. Both have been overplayed and abused, and both have had a positive role to play in film music. However, the greatest moments in Romantically-oriented film music are far superior to the greatest moments in power anthem-oriented film music.

[BLUMENKOHL 1,064]

Except Crimson Tide.

And Gladiator.

And Backdraft.

And that's about it.

[Henry B 49]

Yes. That type of music has pretty limited applications in which it's actually good.

[Mr. Breathmask 480]

Something I've noticed is that the usage of choirs often seems to have a different thing going on now than it did in Williams's golden age. Listen to something like "The Map Room: Dawn" or "Opening Credits/The Seance." I haven't heard choir used that way in any recent scores. Is that a particular way of writing, is it the harmonization, is it the recording, or a combination of some of those factors that make it sound like that?

The choir used to be its own voice.

It now often seems like just another layer to thicken the overall sound (Superman Returns, I'm looking at you).

[FattyMcButterpants 1]

Yeah, the way Ottman layers the choir over the strings in "Memories" ... ugh. It's so sticky and goo-y.

Like Mr. Breathmask said, the choir used to make musical sense in a piece, it wasn't just a few block chords in a row.

[John Crichton 4]

Yes, Superman Returns was a textbook on how not to use chorus.

[Quintus 5,391]

I dunno, I always quite liked the superficial little burst of choir as Superman smashes through the torn wing of the plane. Sure its cheap, but I don't care. Its perfectly effective and acceptable, within the context.

[FattyMcButterpants 1]

A textbook example of how not to use choir AND how to ruin an iconic theme can be heard in "Bank Job", when the Superman fanfare is "backed" by the choir.

So cliche ... almost a parody.

[Romão 1,931]

I love the fantasticaly subtle use of choir in tracks like Palpatine's Teachings (I don't mean the deep throat singing), around the 3.50. Such tasteful use of the choir

[FattyMcButterpants 1]

Well, talent apparently is pure coincidence.

[King Mark 2,924]

I love the fantasticaly subtle use of choir in tracks like Palpatine's Teachings (I don't mean the deep throat singing), around the 3.50. Such tasteful use of the choir

there's also that small unreleased bit at the end of the film version of "Palpatine's Seduction" (Maybe we can use the dark side to save Padme) Absolutely chilling and the reason why John Williams is John Williams.

[Maestro 57]

Choir often works really well in a hymn-type piece, for obvious reasons. My two favorite examples of such are "Hymn to the Fallen" and the theme from "Band of Brothers." The type of voice leading, and the tone of the music, just lends itself to the human voice.

I just love good chorus in a lament piece of music. There are some heartbreaking examples in Schindler's List, Revenge of the Sith, Phantom Menace...

Perhaps a side note, perhaps not: I absolutely love the scene in A.I., near the end of the film, when the "Blue Fairy" is calling David's name from another part of the house. It's very musical the way she calls him, and the way it is accented/accompanied by Williams' poignant music is just so magical. That scene kills me.