The Rise of Skywalker The Rise of Skywalker - COMPLETE SCORE Discussion - SPOILERS ALLOWED!

[DominicCobb 194]

17 hours ago, crumbs said:

The only 'Nazgul Theme'-esque moment for me is Luke & Leia underscoring the conversation between Lando and Jannah. However, that entire sequence was truncated and restructured after Williams scored it. Poe's Theme was deleted (which probably underscored his reunion with Finn) and for all we know the ESB Yoda music was intended for Lando (the B theme is tonally similar to Lando's Palace). The editing always felt jarring there, bizarrely placed between Rey's arrival and the reunion.

 

My theory is Luke & Leia originally underscored a scene between Rey and Luke/Leia's Force ghosts. In the October leaks (which proved accurate), Rey visited the Lars Homestead with everyone watching from the Falcon. Originally she was turning to smile at Finn/Poe/Jannah/etc. at the end, not Force ghosts of Luke and Leia. Make of that what you will...

 

Decent theory but I don't know if I buy it. On paper using Yoda for Lando makes sense (ESB connection and Yoda's theme was used in Cloud City), but the way it plays during Reunion wouldn't really fit the scene with Lando. No I think Williams was kinda just doing a greatest hits roundup and wanted to throw in two of his favorites (Yoda and Luke and Leia). 

 

Watching how the scene plays out you can sort of imagine the reasoning behind them too. Yoda's theme starts up when we see Klaud (the big alien creature) and then plays through the scene of Chewie getting his medal from Maz - so maybe the connection is "puppet creatures." And then Lando and Jannah were originally implied to be related so I think the Luke and Leia theme usage is supposed to work with that familial connection.

[King Mark 3,625]

Yoda ,  Luke and Leia's ghosts were probably in an early version of that scene and maybe that's why those themes are in there

[crocodile 7,984]

I watched the film the other night for the first time since its theatrical run. Since I'm now more familiar with the score it's really distracting to see so many things geitng either dropped, edited or replaced by old music. Is it the worst offender since AOTC? It might be. I know all the SW scores, with the exception of the original maybe, are tinkered with but majority of them make some sense. No wonder so many people were underwhelmed with all this recycling going on. The original material that they keep intact (or relatively intact) works very well.

 

Karol

[Holko 9,499]

3 minutes ago, crocodile said:

Is it the worst offender since AOTC?

Probably the worst offender since ever. TFA was worse than AotC, that only had dropped sections and preplanned tracking. And this is a lot worse than TFA.

[Fabulin 3,510]

On 5/2/2020 at 1:43 AM, DominicCobb said:

Watching how the scene plays out you can sort of imagine the reasoning behind them too. Yoda's theme starts up when we see Klaud (the big alien creature) and then plays through the scene of Chewie getting his medal from Maz - so maybe the connection is "puppet creatures." 

 

yep, as discussed earlier:

 

On 1/5/2020 at 6:13 PM, Fabulin said:

I second that. It's the same moment when Monaghan hugs Klaud. Makes sense, because it's a theme which originally was meant to show that an unremarkable alien could also be a great hero.

 

[crumbs 14,300]

It's the "Thinking of Yoda" music!

 

[Romão 2,274]

3 hours ago, crocodile said:

I watched the film the other night for the first time since its theatrical run. Since I'm now more familiar with the score it's really distracting to see so many things geitng either dropped, edited or replaced by old music. Is it the worst offender since AOTC? It might be. I know all the SW scores, with the exception of the original maybe, are tinkered with but majority of them make some sense. No wonder so many people were underwhelmed with all this recycling going on. The original material that they keep intact (or relatively intact) works very well.

 

Karol

 

 

I think it is easily the worst treated Star Wars score ever. But I'm pretty sure it will be a great listen once it is properly assembled

[crumbs 14,300]

It certainly holds the SW record for most previous scores tracked in (4 out of 8).

[MikeH 768]

I’m listening to the live horn hangout, and the horn player on Ep 9 said that Williams wrote two versions of Finale, with the second version having a different bridge between binary sunset and the end credits!  Ugh, I’d love to hear it instead of the recycled TFA version. 
 

I only caught the last half-hour so hopefully the whole thing will be uploaded soon. 
 

 

 

 

[Jay 37,287]

I'd love to hear that!

[Romão 2,274]

Hopefully it was recorded...

[Jay 37,287]

How would the horn guy be talking about it if he wasn't?  He clearly knows about both because he played both

[Romão 2,274]

Good point 

[crocodile 7,984]

I wouldn't be surprised at all if it turned out Williams recorded brand new pieces for virtually every single one of these controversial "recycled" moments that plagued the last two films.

 

Karol

[Faleel 5,339]

40 minutes ago, Jay said:

How would the horn guy be talking about it if he wasn't?  He clearly knows about both because he played both

Rehearsal that JJ heard and shut down? jk

[crumbs 14,300]

That's so frustrating! Recycling the same transition from TFA was one of my biggest gripes with the score. Please, please, please let this surface on a Matessino set. 

[Not Mr. Big 4,639]

Official music video

 

[crumbs 14,300]

40 minutes ago, Not Mr. Big said:

Official music video

 

 

Ironic cue to use, considering most of it was replaced by Falcon Flight in the film.

[JohnnyD 1,220]

2 hours ago, Not Mr. Big said:

Official music video

 

 

I loved this! Reminded me of the Star Wars: A Musical Journey DVD. If only they did this with The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi, along with more cues from The Rise of Skywalker.

 

Oh well. This was still nice for May the 4th.

[artguy360 1,843]

Strange choice of track for a music video and the whole thing is rather choppy. 

[fommes 153]

Jay, any way you could keep the main post updated with all the new info/most plausible theories that are found in this thread? Or do you keep your spreadsheet up to date?

[Chen G. 3,943]

8 hours ago, JohnnyD said:

Reminded me of the Star Wars: A Musical Journey DVD. If only they did this with The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi, along with more cues from The Rise of Skywalker.

 

Yeah, one of the unfortunate circumstances of Williams working on this "sequel trilogy" (and Solo) is that it renders Star Wars: A Musical Journey incomplete.

[Jay 37,287]

2 hours ago, fommes said:

Jay, any way you could keep the main post updated with all the new info/most plausible theories that are found in this thread? Or do you keep your spreadsheet up to date?

 

Definitely!  I'll get to it as soon as I can

[crumbs 14,300]

Not sure if we knew it already but the horn video confirmed this score had 14 recording days, all double sessions. So 28 three hour sessions altogether (and averaging 8 minutes of finished music every 3 hours, to reach the 224 minutes that John said was recorded). 

 

How does that compare to previous scores? 

[BrotherSound 2,242]

 

1 hour ago, crumbs said:

Not sure if we knew it already but the horn video confirmed this score had 14 recording days, all double sessions. So 28 three hour sessions altogether (and averaging 8 minutes of finished music every 3 hours, to reach the 224 minutes that John said was recorded). 

 

I don't think we've heard this before. The Variety article mentions 11 (rather than 14) days of recording, but doesn't say how many sessions.

 

As far as comparisons with other episodes, which films do we know exact recording dates for? Nothing from the sequel trilogy, but episodes I, II, and IV, right? I add those up if no one else has yet. I don't believe it's yet known how many days or sessions were used for VII and VIII, much less the exact schedule.

[igger6 894]

What an odd video to release now—five months after release, semi-spoilery clips (so it clearly wasn’t designed as advance promotion), not a concert arrangement. I’m all for anything that keeps the score out there prominently, but this is strange. 
 

Was the battle actually tracked with “Falcon Flight”? I am the absolute worst at noticing that stuff in context. 

[crumbs 14,300]

Yes, the first half is unused and was replaced with excerpts from Falcon Flight (with artificially changes to tempo and pitch, just for good measure). 

[Manakin Skywalker 4,891]

This fits so surprisingly well that I'm betting this was used as the temp score during editing:

 

 

[Romão 2,274]

It really does fit quite well. Even the saber hits at the 55 second mark are synched with the brass chords in Battle of the Heroes

[Jay 37,287]

I really don't get why JJ thought it was a good idea to have that scene play with no music

[JohnnyD 1,220]

Funny thing; the Maestro did compose and conduct music for that first-half of the lightsaber duel, and then it would have lead into "The Final Saber Duel." Cool video, though. I can't imagine what the actual music for that first-half of the fight between Rey and Kylo Ren was.

 

Maestro, Lucasfilm and Mike Matessino: please release a remastered, expanded and definitive collection of all nine scores. I don't care how much it would cost to purchase; I'd buy it in a heartbeat.

[MikeH 768]

1 hour ago, Jay said:

I really don't get why JJ thought it was a good idea to have that scene play with no music

Matthew Wood has said it was JW’s suggestion during mixing to drop the music until Kylo appears through the wall of water. 

[Manakin Skywalker 4,891]

34 minutes ago, JohnnyD said:

I don't care how much it would cost to purchase; I'd buy it in a heartbeat.

 

[crumbs 14,300]

Somehow I doubt the removed music sounded anything like the Mustafar battle. For me, the tone of that music doesn't gel with the more brutal, emotive sequel fight. There's a pulpy sense of fun with the Mustafar battle (even though the circumstances are dire) which pairs brilliantly with JW's operatic music. Maybe it's the cartoony/over the top VFX, intercut with Palpatine's antics?

 

TROS is comparatively grim, visually and emotionally. No one's having any fun there. Even without knowing how JW scored it, I can understand why he asked for it to be removed (especially if similar to the music which followed -- a bunch of timpani rolls, brassy Kylo Ren fanfares and tense strings).

 

Mind you, that's an observation of the trilogy as a whole, not isolated to this one scene. The new films are a real downer compared to the first six. JW's sequel writing seems reflective of that, paired with the evolution of his sensibilities in the decade since ROTS.

[JohnnyD 1,220]

 

11 hours ago, Manakin Skywalker said:

 

 

LOL! Seriously, though, a set containing all nine scores would probably be 21 to 22 CDs, judging by my calculations:

 

On 5/1/2020 at 5:09 PM, JohnnyD said:

So for the entire Saga, that would be two CDs for Episode I: The Phantom Menace (two hours and 30 minutes of music), two CDs for Episode II: Attack of the Clones (two hours and ten minutes of music), two CDs for Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (two hours and 15 minutes of music), two CDs for Episode IV: A New Hope (an hour and 32 minutes of music), two CDs for Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (two hours and five minutes of music), two or three CDs for Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (two hours and 40 minutes of music), three CDs for Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2 hours and 56 minutes of music), three CDs for Episode VIII: The Last Jedi (three hours and three minutes of music) three or four CDs for Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker (three hours and 46 minutes of music).

 

So, an eventual set would probably be between $130 to $170, though I might be wrong on that. At max, it could be $200; that might be an overestimation, though.

Either way, it would be worth it and then some!

[Manakin Skywalker 4,891]

24 minutes ago, JohnnyD said:

So, an eventual set would probably be between $130 to $170, though I might be wrong on that. At max, it could be $200; that might be an overestimation, though.

Either way, it would be worth it and then some!

 

Oof! Either way I'd be all over that in a heartbeat!

[Joni Wiljami 1,206]

Oh I would easily pay 1000€ for a box like this!! 

[Fabulin 3,510]

.

[crumbs 14,300]

And to think there's an alternate version as well!

[BrotherSound 2,242]

Ok, so I think I’ve spotted yet another instance of tracking, this time The Sacred Jedi Texts (4M38 Yoda Appears and 4M38 Insert) from The Last Jedi.

 

I hear this passage at 1:58 during the Lando pep talk (“We had each other. That’s how we won”) at 1:29:35 in the movie (going by the iTunes version).

 

This is followed by what I thought was an earlier section of The Sacred Jedi Texts, the low flutes starting about 1:30.

 

 

But on closer inspection, it doesn’t seem to be quite the same. Is there a similar sounding passage elsewhere? Was this somehow created vain microedits with pitch-shifting? Or just a fresh recording of similar material? Any ideas?

 

In the final, the first bit of Lando’s reappearance is still underscored by Plans for the Twins, tracked from ROTS. But it continued on for longer. Then both versions continue on with 31 seconds of music, presumably the same bit of 7M1 Seven One used in the earlier version, but there’s no way to know for sure yet. (Whatever that is appears to also be tracked into the end of the film/FYC version of The Old Death Star.)

 

It’s just wild how much the already hacked-up score was further edited between the November 11th cut and final version!

[JohnnyD 1,220]

12 hours ago, Fabulin said:

The uncut and properly remastered Lando Arrives will be glorious when it gets to that electric organ

 

YES! Also, electric organ?

 

11 hours ago, crumbs said:

And to think there's an alternate version as well!

 

No way! Really? That's awesome.

[crumbs 14,300]

43 minutes ago, JohnnyD said:

No way! Really? That's awesome.

 

Well, there's a listing in the Nov 11 spreadsheet called 7M36 Dunkirk (which doesn't list any existing themes, despite the film version prominently using Luke's Theme). Meanwhile there's a listing in the GEMA database for a cue called The Dunkirk Scene, almost certainly the version in the final film.

[Jay 37,287]

But almost all of reel 7 is missing that theme information in the data we got, could have been the guy putting that together didn't do his job right.  I doubt that scene was ever scored with different music that a huge arrangement of the main theme... there could be multiple variations on that same idea though, who knows

[crumbs 14,300]

It's definitely possible that some of those cues weren't recorded or integrated into the edit by that point, thus had no information about existing themes (or even accurate cue titles, in the case of Dunkirk).

 

Also possible they "cooked the books" slightly with existing themes, to keep that threshold above 80% for award eligibility.

[Fabulin 3,510]

On 5/19/2020 at 5:34 AM, JohnnyD said:

YES! Also, electric organ?

1:12 strings, 1:51 strings doubled with an (electric) organ, or just an electric organ

I can be wrong though! It's all based on a feeling that an organ is playing, and an impression of a legato typical for a keyboard instrument, and not for strings...

 

Compare:

 

Maybe it's one of them "sweeteners" things.

[wowbobwow 69]

What a great score massacred by a terribly mediocre director.  Abrams and his acolytes like Alex Kurtzman are not good storytellers.

[TSMefford 1,509]

1 hour ago, wowbobwow said:

What a great score massacred by a terribly mediocre director.  Abrams and his acolytes like Alex Kurtzman are not good storytellers.

 

I think Abrams is, as he tends to do better when people like Kurtzman, Orci, and Terrio aren't involved in the script.

[JohnnyD 1,220]

On 5/19/2020 at 3:04 AM, Fabulin said:

1:12 strings, 1:51 strings doubled with an (electric) organ, or just an electric organ

 

I can be wrong though! It's all based on a feeling that an organ is playing, and an impression of a legato typical for a keyboard instrument, and not for strings...

 

 

I listened to it carefully, and the section at 1:51 is definitely strings doubled by horn. I cannot tell if there is an organ, but it is possible.

[King Mark 3,625]

dunno, the whole thing sounds different than the End Credits and I want it

[TSMefford 1,509]

Has anyone posted this brief Raw B-Roll from ScoringSessions yet?