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Tanglewood 2018: Williams to Conduct at Film Night, the Bernstein Concert, and Parade


Will

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1 minute ago, Jurassic Shark said:

It's just that in such two-part concerts, with "golden age" scores in the first half, the selections can sometimes be quite boring.

 

Are you calling John Williams boring? That's OUTRAGEOUS. I'm OUTRAGED. How dare you make sure an unfair accusation. It's practically libelous.

 

I'm taking this to my nearest council representative. They will... take care of you.

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8 minutes ago, Ricard said:

 

The program was available in this same thread, then retyped by myself on the main page, then copy-pasted from the main page to this thread by 'aescalle'. So you're welcome ;)

 

So you made the error about Laura Raksin.

 

You can't even retype a text without making an error. Pffff... ;)

 

Considering the price we pay you to be here... we expect a little more rigour.

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5 minutes ago, Bespin said:

 

So you made the error about Laura Raksin.

 

You can't even retype a text without making an error. Pffff... ;)

 

Considering the price we pay you to be here... we expect a little more rigour.

 

Bitchy!

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Spoiler

In fact, we suspected a long time ago that R2-D2 was a girl and not a boy.  We'll learn in Episode IX that her real name is Lara Rakskin, and that she's a lesbian (it explains the rather well built form of R2-D2).

 

You wanted a mega-final twist for Episode IX, that's it...

 

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1 hour ago, Jurassic Shark said:

I'm listening to the broadcast now, and JW just confirmed that Han Solo and the Princess in indeed a love theme! But not the first one - that was Leia's theme, he told.

 

:lol:

 

I cant find a link to the broadcast... I'd be grateful if you could share one....

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He indeed said that he wrote Leia's Theme as a love theme and Han Solo and the Princess as a love theme as well.

Did you hear the story about Dry Your Tears Africa, though?  That was a new one for me.

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19 hours ago, Matt S. said:

Damn, I think John must have a bus to catch, he’s conducting everything so fast!

 

It's those darn clips of film montages with too many cuts. The conductors are glued to the screen with the "streamers" and sync points.

 

Even Andris Nelsons isn't his enthusiastic self when having to follow the screen in front of him. Last year's performance of Tintin had the opposite effect (too slow). I would have imagined an even quicker pace coming from him if it wasn't for the "swashbuckling" montage.

 

Call of the Champions must have started behind as the beginning was performed extremely fast to catch up. That led to a few false notes from the orchestra, as with Duel of the Fates.

 

If they're illustrating film scoring like "Indy's First Adventure" and the final real from "E.T." they have a purpose, but having a montage for every second piece throughout the night is way too much. The music would sound so much better if they didn't have to be distracted with the clips. It's why E.T. was recut to begin with!

 

"Dry Your Tears, Afrika" was one of the evening's best performances. Williams gave it 110%, moved as though he was 20 years younger and even sang/mouthed the words along with the chorus. Hoping a video clip of that will get released some day. I wish Andris Nelsons could have come back onstage with his trumpet for "The Long Road to Justice".

 

Williams' giving the backstory to Amistad (how the words were translated from a French poem to English and back to Mende) was quite informative as well, minus the guy in the back of the shed who cheered "Woohoo" when the maestro pointed out that the Portuguese ship carrying slaves arrived somewhere in Connecticut, thinking it should be a source of pride. 🙄

 

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11 hours ago, Bespin said:

Yesterday I Air Conducted the Duel of the Fates, I was so good!

 

I really don't know if I could do this again when I'll turn 86 years old. I cracked two ribs.

 

Chapeau Maestro!

 

Indeed! Though having seen it live, he did conduct most of it in 2 (every second beat), rather than every beat in 4/4 like on the "behind the scenes" DVD extra of the original recording. Still amazing though!

 

Another slight disappointment about the BUTI young artists chorus... there way too many girls compared to boys (I figure it must have been about 80/20). Sad that so many boys lost interest in singing that most orchestras outside Vienna can't get a gender-balanced chorus. I noticed the same thing even in Amsterdam with a performance of Mahler 3 at the Concertgebouw in 2015.

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Wow, Dry Your Tears, Africa is performed extremely fast right from the start. It was kind of surprising. 

Edit: The performance of The Rebellion is Reborn is really good! Better than the last one JW conducted in Boston. It starts out quite punchy but also finds its quieter moments comfortably. Not good enough to top the OST version though. 

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23 hours ago, Bespin said:

 

So you made the error about Laura Raksin.

 

You can't even retype a text without making an error. Pffff... ;)

 

Considering the price we pay you to be here... we expect a little more rigour.

 

Hmm... the Mass Live reviewer made the same error and he actually gets paid... 😮

 

Quote

The Boston Pops offered a masterful take on David Raskin's haunting heme from "Laura,"

 

https://www.masslive.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2018/08/john_williams_film_night.html

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11 minutes ago, Ricard said:

 

Hmm... the Mass Live reviewer made the same error and he actually gets paid... 😮

 

 

https://www.masslive.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2018/08/john_williams_film_night.html

 

Even the bloody journalists are spelling it wrong!

 

For the tenth time, it's Rakskin!

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