I can't believe it's not John Williams! (the best imitators)

[Manakin Skywalker 3606]

2 hours ago, Pando said:

I think Thomas Bergersen comes pretty close. His music is always an inspiration.

 

This track might have come straight from the latest star wars and no one would have noticed that it's not JW.

 

This is a MIDI mockup he did more than 10 years ago to showcase his private library.

 

 

 

Anyone know what instrument library he's using?

 

EDIT: Nevermind. He uses 2 custom/private libraries mixed with VSL.

[Pando 137]

4 hours ago, Fabulin said:

So... this composer actually invented Williams' Star Wars sequel sound before Williams himself did it?

 

More like inspired by the prequel sound. I just looked up, it was done in July 2006, so after RotS came out. There was even a MIDI file of this floating around, the first 25 seconds of it. I may even have it stashed away in a hard drive somewhere.

[A Farewell to Kings 3576]

3 hours ago, Edmilson said:

This cue is also pretty Sequel-esque, with a bit of Indiana Jones thrown in:

 

 

 

Such a great moment.

[Edmilson 4514]

Indeed. Fallen Order's score was pretty great.

[King Mark 3182]

this Desplat cue from Rise of the Guardians sounds like Williams. The opening notes intro  remind me of a Williams cue I can't quite place  and it's bugging me

 

 

[zoltan_902 141]

Try Mike Batt's score to 'The Dreamstone'. It's not a deliberate or obvious imitation of John Williams, rather it's an alternative prime example of memorable, richly thematic, Romantically orchestrated television scoring - which are the same characteristics I so admire about JW's best works.   
 

 

[Jediwashington 59]

Randol Bass definitely gets on this list. He has some corny stuff for educational ensembles, but his Gloria written in 1990 actually predates Call of the Champions by quite a bit despite sounding really similar. Can't find a good recording of his night before christmas, but it has elements of that childlike orchestration from ET, BFG, and Home Alone etc.

 

 

[Dr. Know 250]

Don't forget Sam Cardon.

One of my favorite works in this category is Kevin Kaska's concert work "The Wizard of Menlo Park."  The finale is especially Williams-esque.

[bruce marshall 1259]

I don't count McNealy and Debney as Williams imitators as their entire career is based on imitating other composers e.g. Horner

For a good one off try Rosenthal and CLASH OF THE TITANS( SW)

or SKY CAPTAIN which is a RAIDERS knockoff.

 

JG did a good JW in KING SOLOMON'S MINES

[karelm 2587]

Though Conrad Pope might be more famous as an orchestrator for A list composers, he's also a fantastic composer.  For example, check out his fabulous score to Ghost Ship which is a must hear to any fan of JW or Horner.

 

[TownerFan 4974]

Conrad wrote a delightful score for chamber orchestra for the documentary Tim's Vermeer a few years ago. The main theme is Desplat-esque (it was likely temped with Girl with a Pearl Earring), but there is a lot to enjoy:

 

 

 

 

 

[bruce marshall 1259]

WATERWORLD .

action cues only. Pretty derivative.

[Dr. Know 250]

Benny Oschmann has a great new demo cue for Berlin Symphonic Strings called "The Great Sled Dog Race" that's got the vibe.  Check it out on the audio demo page here:

 

https://www.orchestraltools.com/store/collections/berlin-symphonic-strings

 

[bored 228]

I always thought Jeremy Soule's early work was great at scratching the Williams / melodic itch.

 

 

 

I also really love Jacob A. Cadmus' score to Star Wars Theory's Vader fan film. It's such high quality for a film that's essentially nothing but fan service.

 

[Dr. Know 250]

I give you Cameron Moody...

And here he is conducting his own piece.

 

 

[DarthDementous 873]

Some of Mark Griskey's action tracks for KOTOR 2 do the Star Wars sound so well that I'm almost tricked into thinking they were unused action cues for the Prequels. Clearly I'm not the only one that thinks this, because they ended up intermingling a few of them along with Williams music in the Revenge of the Sith PS2 game:

 

[Docteur Qui 1418]

1 hour ago, Dr. Know said:

I give you Cameron Moody...

And here he is conducting his own piece.

 

 

 

I met Cameron a few years ago at a scoring workshop in New York, he was 15 at the time and blew everyone away with his skill. I thought I was going to be the biggest Williams fan there until I met him! Great to see his music shared here, he's very driven and very talented and a really nice guy. I hope to hear more of his his own personal style develop and mature, but have no doubt that will happen.

[BB-8 1736]

I found these to contain several stylistic elements reminiscent of JW's action music:

 

 

 

[TheAvengerButton 132]

15 hours ago, DarthDementous said:

Some of Mark Griskey's action tracks for KOTOR 2 do the Star Wars sound so well that I'm almost tricked into thinking they were unused action cues for the Prequels. Clearly I'm not the only one that thinks this, because they ended up intermingling a few of them along with Williams music in the Revenge of the Sith PS2 game:

I absolutely love Griskey's game scores for Star Wars. I hope that KOTOR II being released on the Wii will give us some higher quality music to listen to. His KOTOR II score and the Force Unleashed scores absolutely need an official high quality release somehow. SOMEHOW.

[DarthDementous 873]

6 hours ago, TheAvengerButton said:

I absolutely love Griskey's game scores for Star Wars. I hope that KOTOR II being released on the Wii will give us some higher quality music to listen to. His KOTOR II score and the Force Unleashed scores absolutely need an official high quality release somehow. SOMEHOW.

I assume you mean the Switch and not the Wii, the latter would be wild though (hold up joycon facing up to choke life out of opponent)

 

The video I linked and the rest of the KOTOR 2 tracks on that channel are probably the most HQ versions I’ve found so far, for a while there was only highly compressed LQ out there. They’ve also been nicely edited together
 

As a bonus, here's a comment from the composer himself I found on those videos about his attitude when writing a Star Wars score:

[Drew 557]

The unofficial YouTube upload of the KOTOR II soundtrack got blocked by UMG by being copyright claimed with tracks with an unknown release. It is possible an official KOTOR II album is being released.

[DarthDementous 873]

16 hours ago, Drew said:

The unofficial YouTube upload of the KOTOR II soundtrack got blocked by UMG by being copyright claimed with tracks with an unknown release. It is possible an official KOTOR II album is being released.

Oh my, it's possible! Especially with the imminent release of the port. Fingers crossed

[artguy360 1675]

On 29/05/2022 at 6:12 PM, Dr. Know said:

I give you Cameron Moody...

And here he is conducting his own piece.

 

 

Wow! I've never heard of this composer before. There is so much of JW's sound in Moody's compositions shown here. It's actually exciting to hear someone writing in the same stylistic ballpark as JW as a modern composer.

 

Wow again, I just listened to his re-score for this chase scene and you will literally think you are listening to JW action music with a slightly different voice. But the rhythmic tendencies and orchestration is totally JW. 

 

https://youtu.be/ym-AZjPZ-a0

[Tydirium 848]

On 15/7/2020 at 11:16 PM, King Mark said:

this Desplat cue from Rise of the Guardians sounds like Williams. The opening notes intro  remind me of a Williams cue I can't quite place  and it's bugging me

 

 

The beginning of that track for some reason reminds me of the beginning of “Rescue” from the Rise of Skywalker FYC.

[artguy360 1675]

This track from The Duel from Stars Wars: Visions sounds a lot like JW. I think it is clear the entire short was temped with JW SW music including Duel of the Fates.

 

https://youtu.be/8SilZykdpYE

[Darth Mulder 109]

Many people writes Harry Potter references to comment section. I specifically don't hear anything from HP in there. It's just interesting that all the orchestral music sounds like Williams to the young generation.

 

 

[Dr. Know 250]

Randol Bass was mentioned earlier in this thread.  He really is an amazing composer, especially of Christmas medleys and arrangements.  Here's a band piece in JW-mode.

 

 

[DarthDementous 873]

19 hours ago, artguy360 said:

This track from The Duel from Stars Wars: Visions sounds a lot like JW. I think it is clear the entire short was temped with JW SW music including Duel of the Fates.

 

 

Big Scherzo for X-Wings vibes at the start there

The main duel piece actually reminds me of The Force Unleashed theme funnily enough, which itself is a good candidate for this thread. Well done to Jesse Harlin and Mark Griskey:

 

[DarthDementous 873]

Thought I would give the spotlight to some of the lesser known Star Wars composers

 

Enter Lennie Moore, who delivered this piece for the game Star Wars the Old Republic as the planet theme for Coruscant

 

Often when composers try to write in the Star Wars style it’s predominantly influenced by Prequel era music, but what I find so special about this track is how much it evokes the Original trilogy with its simultaneously soaring romantic quality as well as its uneasy dissonance. The main Coruscant theme is just majestic as well:

 

[karelm 2587]

23 hours ago, DarthDementous said:

Thought I would give the spotlight to some of the lesser known Star Wars composers

 

Enter Lennie Moore, who delivered this piece for the game Star Wars the Old Republic as the planet theme for Coruscant

 

Often when composers try to write in the Star Wars style it’s predominantly influenced by Prequel era music, but what I find so special about this track is how much it evokes the Original trilogy with its simultaneously soaring romantic quality as well as its uneasy dissonance. The main Coruscant theme is just majestic as well:

 

Lennie is a fantastic composer!  

[DarthDementous 873]

26 minutes ago, karelm said:

Lennie is a fantastic composer!  

I was really impressed with his stuff for SWTOR. What are some of his other tracks that you'd recommend?

[Drew 557]

On 08/06/2022 at 6:56 AM, Darth Mulder said:

Many people writes Harry Potter references to comment section. I specifically don't hear anything from HP in there. It's just interesting that all the orchestral music sounds like Williams to the young generation.

 

 

 

This music stood out to me when I played the game. Is it on the soundtrack album?

[Darth Mulder 109]

9 hours ago, Drew said:

This music stood out to me when I played the game. Is it on the soundtrack album?

 

Yes, of course. 

 

[Tom Guernsey 1439]

I posted this in the classical recommendation thread but really wanted to post it here (but couldn't remember the thread name), anyway...

 

I went a bit mad in the Presto Classical sale, particularly Naxos hi-res downloads which are around £3 each, I've now bought almost everything that qualifies in the sale from my wish list (classical music really is a much cheaper hobby than film music!). I'm sure I'll have lots of great discoveries but I wanted to recommend the album Balance of Power by Peter Boyer, which is basically an album of short-ish orchestral works but basically if you want more music in JW 80s Olympic theme style, not to mention plenty that takes more than a little inspiration from his film music (the Americana stuff like Saving Private Ryan), if more in style than anything specific (a bit like Kevin Kaska's concert works that sound like action music from AOTC etc.), then this is definitely worth picking up. There's another Boyer album of his first symphony and various other short concert works which are all very much in the same vein. Being on Naxos, they are dirt cheap, but it's the LSO in great sound... as I said, collecting classical music is a whole lot cheaper than film music sometimes!

[artguy360 1675]

On 07/08/2022 at 10:22 AM, Tom Guernsey said:

I posted this in the classical recommendation thread but really wanted to post it here (but couldn't remember the thread name), anyway...

 

I went a bit mad in the Presto Classical sale, particularly Naxos hi-res downloads which are around £3 each, I've now bought almost everything that qualifies in the sale from my wish list (classical music really is a much cheaper hobby than film music!). I'm sure I'll have lots of great discoveries but I wanted to recommend the album Balance of Power by Peter Boyer, which is basically an album of short-ish orchestral works but basically if you want more music in JW 80s Olympic theme style, not to mention plenty that takes more than a little inspiration from his film music (the Americana stuff like Saving Private Ryan), if more in style than anything specific (a bit like Kevin Kaska's concert works that sound like action music from AOTC etc.), then this is definitely worth picking up. There's another Boyer album of his first symphony and various other short concert works which are all very much in the same vein. Being on Naxos, they are dirt cheap, but it's the LSO in great sound... as I said, collecting classical music is a whole lot cheaper than film music sometimes!

Thank you for sharing. I'm listening to this album now and the music is quite good. Boyer shares the same musical language as JW, it's almost like listening to some JW alternate tracks in many cases. I hope that isn't insulting to Boyer.

[stravinsky 192]

Can anyone remind me of the name of the guy who wrote some of the Trailer music for Ep IX? Young English guy I think. I hate to say it but this particular imitator wrote a theme which outclassed all the others written for the movie itself. 

[Fabulin 3433]

2 hours ago, stravinsky said:

Can anyone remind me of the name of the guy who wrote some of the Trailer music for Ep IX? Young English guy I think. I hate to say it but this particular imitator wrote a theme which outclassed all the others written for the movie itself. 

James Brett - Space Battalions

[Jay 31064]

Yea, there's a fun 6 page thread about it

 

https://www.jwfan.com/forums/index.php?/topic/30645-space-battalions-by-james

[stravinsky 192]

Thankyou very much! 

[ocelot 478]

On 3/1/2020 at 7:16 PM, Dr. Know said:

Highly recommended -- Wael Binali's concert pieces "Niramaya," "Earth, Plunder, Wound, Renewal, Hope," and Shaffalah Suite.  He's brilliant!  Also, Benny Oschmann's "The Dwarves" video game score and Hendrik Schwarzer's orchestral music for Europa-Park...

Oh my goodness, never saw this, thank you so much!

[MrJosh 651]

 

Starting around 1:40 or so sounds kinda familiar!

 

Sounds like this and the first Claus movie are probably fun scores, I must check them out!

[BB-8 1736]

I don't know where to put this, really.

 

 

 

Here's the full "OST" in case someone want's to analyse the use of mock JW Leitmotivs...

 

[Loert 2296]

That track sounds fantastic in game, I couldn't help but grin during that moment.

 

The OST overall reminds me more of Elfman than Williams, but there are some moments in there which definitely have that HP-Columbus-era sound. Here's another example: