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The Legacy of John Williams (Website & Podcast)


TownerFan

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  • 2 weeks later...
5 hours ago, bollemanneke said:

Same, but that means no July releases I'm guessing...

 

I don't think that would be a factor for future upcoming releases in the near future.  If anything, it will allow more time to be spent discussing just two releases vs 3-4 on the interview.  Quality vs quantity! :)

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9 hours ago, bollemanneke said:

I meant that releasing this interview now might mean we won't be getting any other JW expansions soon.


I don’t think so. The year is not over yet. ;)

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48 minutes ago, crumbs said:

Didn't Intrada have Williams on their list? I think basically every other composer who was on that list is accounted for.

Watch it be Solo deluxe on CD ;) (yes I know its more Powell than Williams, its a joke)

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2 hours ago, TownerFan said:

You guys are now faster than me :)

 

Hope you will enjoy this long-awaited episode!

Yes! Thank you.

By the way, when you were talking about the sound and the mood of the score and the way electronics are used I was wondering why noone mentioned Stepmom. Because that is for me the score where I see the most similarities to Always. 

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2 hours ago, TownerFan said:

You guys are now faster than me :)

 

Hope you will enjoy this long-awaited episode!

Another great episode Maurizio! Very interesting discussion and it's nice to hear Williams fans just exchanging views and opinions on his music as well as offering great insights.

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6 hours ago, Chewy said:

Great conversation indeed!

 

Tim Burden saying at the end "before we move away from Always..." makes me think you guys then talked about a third thing that isn't announced yet. Exciting!

 

Yeah I thought it was curious there wasn't the regular goodbye at the end. Seems like the conversation continued but wasn't included...

 

Great podcast though! Nice to hear Titus getting some love for his amazing artwork.

 

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I loved the discussion on Williams' use of electronics. Although he is considered this big writer of orchestral music, his film scores contain quite a bit of electronic enhancement. Very rarely it becomes the "gimmick" though or the dominating sound in his scores and Williams never went the Goldsmith route of actually taking time to learn to use these "electronic sound sources" as he likes to put it.

 

I remember in one 1999 interview regarding the Phantom Menace score Williams makes mention, how he usually uses the electronics to enhance the actual orchestral sound, augmenting the woodwinds or strings or other sections of the orchestra. In this case he was making a point that the Star Wars scores are 99 % pure orchestra but there are some electronic elements here and there.  If you listen to his music this does apply to a lot of the electronic elements in it. And as he isn't proficient to create these pads, using samples etc. himself, he relies on his close collaborators to achieve what he wants and he trusts them to come up with the required sound. It would be interesting to know, how closely he works with e.g. Randy Kerber, Ralph Grierson and others to create these sounds and does he have a hands on approach where he listens to their creations and either accepts or rejects them or does he really give them entirely free reign to come up what he describes in broad terms. I can't on the top of my head remember if Grierson made mention of this in his interview with you Maurizio.

 

Sometimes of course Williams wants to achieve a colour or the effect he can't get from the orchestral instruments and then the synthesizers come into play but again they do not often blatantly call attention to themselves. A good example is The Lost World where Williams used descriptors like animal sounds which translates into hollow synthetic moans that very well blend into the orchestral writing and enhance e.g. the appearance of the raptors and the demise of Ludlow. They are there but are not necessarily showcased on top of the writing. Some exceptions do exist, with a few examples off the top of my head, the music for heaven in Always, parts of Presumed Innocent and large portions of Heartbeeps (perhaps the most blatant use of synths in any Williams score) and something like the heartbeat assassination motif from Munich.

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  • 1 month later...
20 minutes ago, Remco said:

Williams himself actually played the Rey’s theme quote at the TROS climax.

 

:lovethis:

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Fantastic conversation Maurizio! If it wasn’t 10:00PM I would have picked up the 🎺  and go play through With Malice Towards None…so motivating. Also very cool to hear about the different spots where JW himself is performing the piano solos. 
Looking forward to the next one.

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Great episode! I love these conversations with amazing studio musicians. BTW, if anyone is interested you can actually watch JW play his bit in TROS in the short featurette in him. Pretty sure it's available on YouTube. Daisy Ridley is standing right over his shoulder as he plays.

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That's right. I always assumed he was just demonstrating the theme to Daisy there, because the orchestra doesn't play. I guess they overdubbed it, which makes sense given the piano stands out a lot in the mix.

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3 hours ago, Remco said:

That's right. I always assumed he was just demonstrating the theme to Daisy there, because the orchestra doesn't play. I guess they overdubbed it, which makes sense given the piano stands out a lot in the mix.

 

It's definitely overdubbed. Very obvious if you inspect the spectograms.

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  • 3 weeks later...
16 hours ago, TownerFan said:

 

https://thelegacyofjohnwilliams.com/2021/12/10/legacy-conversations-alexander-courage/

 

I hope you'll take some time to listen to this. We're very proud at how it turned out.


This was such a lovely listen.  Thank you!

 

I’ve been fascinated by the career and work of Courage, as well as Angela Morley, ever since I started noticing their names pop up in so many Boston Pops album liner notes.

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  • 5 weeks later...
13 hours ago, bollemanneke said:

Listening to the Louise Di Tulllio episode. Love the remarks about the flute being joy in War Horse. And then hearing that solo... it's the first time I heard so much joy in it. What an amazing blog.

 

Coincidentally I also caught up on this episode yesterday, a wonderful conversation!

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