New interview with John Williams in The Times

[Lewya 361]

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/interview-john-williams-at-89-the-man-behind-the-best-and-most-hummable-film-scores-6z32zqz3h

 

Interview: John Williams at 89, the man behind the best (and most hummable) film scores

The composer tells Richard Morrison about his decades-long career — including the time he helped out a struggling LSO with ‘some sci‑fi film’

 

He left it late, but in January this year John Williams added another achievement to a body of work that includes more than 100 film scores, dozens of symphonic works and 52 Academy award nominations. Just a few weeks shy of his 88th birthday he made his conducting debut with the Vienna Philharmonic in the ornately gilded Golden Hall of the Musikverein.

 

The concert, filmed and recorded by Deutsche Grammophon and released next week, was remarkable for several reasons. According to Williams, this venerable orchestra had never played a note of his music before. It certainly made up for lost time, delivering extracts from more than a dozen of Williams’s greatest scores, including Star Wars, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, the Harry Potter films, Jurassic Park, ET, Jaws and Schindler’s List.

 

And the Viennese musicians weren’t the only ones venturing into unfamiliar territory. “Although I’ve done a lot of concert work in America, I had never conducted publicly in Europe before,” Williams admits, speaking down the phone from his Los Angeles home. “And I never really intended to. It always seemed a long way from California. When this invitation came, however, I thought, ‘Well, if I’m ever to conduct a concert in Europe in this lifetime, I’d better get on with it.’ And there’s no greater honour than being invited to conduct in the Musikverein.”

 

Was Williams aware of the history of the hall as he walked out on to that famous platform? After all, in his remarks from the conductor’s podium he referred to his soundtracks for the Star Wars films — all nine of them — as “a nice round number”, a remark clearly picked up by the Viennese audience as an allusion to the number of symphonies written by Beethoven, Schubert, Mahler and Bruckner.

 

“Absolutely,” he replies. “For any composer, to visit Vienna is a spiritual journey. It’s as much of a Mecca as we musicians have. Especially if, like me, you revere Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Brahms, Mahler. Just the chance to breathe the same air as Haydn — one of the purest, most instinctive talents in the history of music — was more than I could resist.”

 

Which of those composers would Williams most liked to have met? “Oh, Beethoven of course,” Williams says. “I still read through his scores for the pleasure of what I hear in my head, and for the beauty I find in their craftsmanship. And I think he might have been interested in film if he’d lived 200 years later, though he probably would have been horrified by having his music drowned out by the noise of spaceships flying past.”

 

And how did the Vienna Philharmonic take to Williams’s epic film scores? “They rose to the challenge brilliantly,” the composer says. “To be honest, I was a bit concerned before I got there. I know they have this fabulous romantic sound, and they can seem to turn on 19th-century style more genuinely than any other orchestra — but I had worries about the rotary valve trumpets [a more old-fashioned form of trumpet, still favoured in German and Austrian orchestras]. I was concerned about so much upper-register work being played by trumpets without the sort of pistons we use in Britain and America. I need not have worried, though: the trumpets were fabulous. Their pitching and power blew me away.”

 

Hearing music from so many films and decades collected together on one recording makes one appreciate the protean nature of Williams’s genius. There is no single “Williams style”. Yes, the swaggering imperial marches of Star Wars and Raiders of the Lost Ark might be regarded as a hallmark, but so might the spooky, bitonal shifts of the Harry Potter score, or the relentless Prokofiev-like ostinatos of Jaws, or the uneasy Vaughan Williams-like pastoralism of War Horse, or the Yiddish melancholy of Schindler’s List. Does Williams recognise this aspect of his craft, the ability to use the past 200 years of orchestral composition in the way that a painter might use a palette, selecting the colours and textures appropriate to the mood of each movie?

 

“Yes, that’s the essence of being a film composer,” he says. “We are asked to conjure all sorts of moods. I remember in my early days being asked to write burlesque and vaudeville-type music for comedies simultaneously with supplying big romantic scores for dramas. If you are going to write music for cinema, or at least for more than one or two films, you have to accept all varieties of challenge. It goes with the territory.”

 

And although few people think of Williams as an avant-garde composer, there are many moments in his films when he displays a remarkable grasp of what were, at the time, very avant-garde techniques. The nebulous string clusters that open Close Encounters, for instance, could have come straight out of a score by Ligeti or Penderecki. “Yes, it’s true,” Williams acknowledges. “In film there’s often the need for a composer to change gear even in the space of a few minutes. So in Close Encounters, yes, you get those Penderecki-like clusters, but they are then combined with a romantic tune, all in the course of a six-minute sequence.”

 

Does his inspiration ever dry up? Down the phone there is a sardonic chuckle. “There can be no such thing as writer’s block in film composition,” he says. “You are closer to being a journalist than a novelist. You have a certain number of days to write a certain number of minutes of music, and you have to get on with it. It’s a job of carpentry, of manufacturing musical things.”

 

So he never hits a blank? “Oh sometimes, but if there’s a section of a scene I can’t think how to treat I will just move on to another bit, then come back to it. It usually solves itself.”

 

How much do film directors help or hinder the process? Another knowing chuckle down the line. “Directors will always talk about what they think they want musically,” Williams replies. “And I always listen to them. But usually when I get to the piano and start to work, those ideas are pretty much gone. It’s always better for me to respond to the visual material — the film that’s actually being shot — than to verbal instructions.

 

“And of course there’s huge variety in that species of humanity called film directors. Some are very musical. Others are suspicious of using music at all.”

 

Where does Steven Spielberg, the director with whom Williams has collaborated for 46 years, sit in that spectrum? “Oh, with Steven there can’t be enough music,” Williams exclaims. “He always wants more and more. It’s rather touching in its way. He will come to a recording session that ends at a certain hour, the musicians will be packing up, and Steven will say, ‘Where are they going? Why are you stopping? Haven’t you got anything else you can play?’ He just loves the process so much.”

 

Williams admits to being a “child of Hollywood” — his father, a jazz drummer, moved the family there in 1948, and Williams began his career playing piano in Hollywood orchestras throughout the 1950s. Yet some of his most famous scores for Spielberg were recorded not in Hollywood, but in Britain, with the London Symphony Orchestra at Denham or Shepperton studios.

 

“I was introduced to the LSO by my dear friend André Previn, when he was the orchestra’s principal conductor, and of course the LSO players were whizz kids at sight-reading, so we made many recordings together,” Williams recalls.

 

In fact, the story is more dramatic than that. In 1976 the LSO — in desperate financial difficulties — asked Previn if he could write another film score so the orchestra could make some money by recording it. Previn said he was too busy, but offered to phone a friend who was writing a score for “some sci-fi film”.

 

The friend was Williams, who said he would hire the LSO as long as the orchestra could squeeze in 18 sessions in the next month. The orchestra agreed, as long as some sessions could begin at 11pm, after its regular concerts were over. And thus was the soundtrack to Star Wars recorded.

 

Even more extraordinary, the LSO had just recruited a new principal trumpet — the soon-to-be-legendary Maurice Murphy. So on his first day in his new job Murphy’s first task was to blast the opening notes of one of the 20th century’s greatest movie melodies.

 

“Yes, Maurice came out to Denham and we started with the fanfare from Star Wars,” Williams recalls. “And of course he shocked the world by hitting that top C with that extrovert, heroic, raw timbre he had — the perfect sound for the kind of action film that Star Wars was. I loved him from that moment! We always said that we would have a round of golf together, but of course we never found the time, and then he died way too soon.”

 

With most work in Hollywood suspended during the pandemic, Williams might be forgiven for taking a well-earned break from composition. Not a bit of it. He’s spending his time finishing a violin concerto for Anne-Sophie Mutter, who also features in the Vienna concert playing virtuoso arrangements of his soundtracks (“Harry Potter meets Paganini,” Williams quips). Astonishingly, it will be the 19th concerto or quasi-concerto he has written for the concert hall.

 

“I think of my work outside film as being part of my own musical self-education,” he says. “And believe me, the road to being harp-savvy enough to write a harp concerto is a long one. But it’s also nice to write something that doesn’t require the approval of a studio boss. And, you know, even if I wasn’t being paid I would always want to write music. The greatest thrill of my life has been hearing my music played, almost immediately, by wonderful orchestras. It’s something I wish every composer could experience.”

 

He’s not so far away from his tenth decade. Does he ever contemplate hanging up his quill? “Never,” he says. “I will press on. Music isn’t a profession. It’s my oxygen. Take that away and I’d really be in trouble.”

[Maestro 1,604]

He's not 89.

[artguy360 2,237]

Some nice JW quotes in this interview.

[Holko 12,083]

Thanks for copying the text for non-subscribers!

[Jay 46,476]

24 minutes ago, Lewya said:

He’s not so far away from his tenth decade. Does he ever contemplate hanging up his quill? “Never,” he says. “I will press on. Music isn’t a profession. It’s my oxygen. Take that away and I’d really be in trouble.”

 

Amazing

[Jurassic Shark 16,456]

36 minutes ago, Lewya said:

John Williams at 89

 

So he's lying about his age now?

 

36 minutes ago, Lewya said:

I had never conducted publicly in Europe before

 

John, UK didn't leave Europe, only the EU. Confusing, I know.

 

36 minutes ago, Lewya said:

And I never really intended to. It always seemed a long way from California. When this invitation came, however

 

It's not any longer than to the UK...

 

[Falstaft 2,242]

Wonderful! Thanks for pasting the text.

 

53 minutes ago, Lewya said:

Which of those composers would Williams most liked to have met? “Oh, Beethoven of course,” Williams says. “I still read through his scores for the pleasure of what I hear in my head, and for the beauty I find in their craftsmanship. And I think he might have been interested in film if he’d lived 200 years later, though he probably would have been horrified by having his music drowned out by the noise of spaceships flying past.”

 

I love how, rather than coming out and saying he's pissed off so much of his own music is inaudible, he comes up with this cute, hedgy subjunctive that Beethoven would have been pissed! 

 

The man is nothing if not diplomatic, but he sure does seem to be expressing this frustration more often and more openly as of late...

[Sunshine Reger 3,714]

10 minutes ago, Falstaft said:

I love how, rather than coming out and saying he's pissed off so much of his own music is inaudible, he comes up with this cute, hedgy subjunctive that Beethoven would have been pissed! 

I am more intrigued that over just 4 years Beethoven went from shunning Hollywood to becoming a potential film composer  I guess Williams is being very persuasive.

[Jurassic Shark 16,456]

He's just mixing up Beethoven and Wagner.

[Not Mr. Big 5,011]

I love the bit about specific musical instructions from directors

[Doug Adams 540]

3 hours ago, Lewya said:

He’s not so far away from his tenth decade. Does he ever contemplate hanging up his quill? “Never,” he says. “I will press on. Music isn’t a profession. It’s my oxygen. Take that away and I’d really be in trouble.”

That's the last time I get my insider news from Harry Potter fan sites!

[Tom 6,923]

I love the following bit: It is Williams' way of patting the director on the head and saying, "That is a really good idea Mr. Director.  You are so smart and talented." 

 

How much do film directors help or hinder the process? Another knowing chuckle down the line. “Directors will always talk about what they think they want musically,” Williams replies. “And I always listen to them. But usually when I get to the piano and start to work, those ideas are pretty much gone. It’s always better for me to respond to the visual material — the film that’s actually being shot — than to verbal instructions.

[Edmilson 12,421]

3 hours ago, Jay said:

 

Amazing

 

Indeed. I wish to love my job as much as Williams loves writing music.

[Jurassic Shark 16,456]

Just now, Edmilson said:

 

Indeed. I wish to love my job as much as Williams loves writing music.

 

Then you should start writing great music.

3 hours ago, Lewya said:

He’s not so far away from his tenth decade. Does he ever contemplate hanging up his quill? “Never,” he says. “I will press on. Music isn’t a profession. It’s my oxygen. Take that away and I’d really be in trouble.”

 

Did JW just admit that he composes instead of breathing oxygen? He's more machine than man!

[bruce marshall 1,989]

2 hours ago, Jurassic Shark said:

 

 

 

Did W just admit that he composes instead of breathing oxygen? He's more machine than man!

Maybe he bought  one of those precious ventilators on the dark web😝

2 hours ago, Tom said:

 

 

How much do film directors help or hinder the process? Another knowing chuckle down the line. “Directors will always talk about what .... But usually when I get to the piano and start to work, those ideas are pretty much gone.

Pheh!

Morricone doesn't need to sit down at a piano to compose.

He just needs staff paper; like any REAL composer!😔😜

[Sunshine Reger 3,714]

14 minutes ago, bruce marshall said:

Morricone doesn't need to sit down at a piano to compose.

He just needs staff paper; like any REAL composer!😔😜

 

Quote

„What’s the advantage of composing at the piano or not? It’s a musical crutch; some composers need it more than the others. Stravinsky does, he likes to be in touch with the sound. Ravel also did. Wagner and [Richard] Strauss didn’t”---Bernard Herrmann, 26.09.1970

 

Quote

"My room that I'm moving to is being prepared—I'm just off now to hire a keyboard, because I can't live there until that's been delivered, especially as I've got to write just now, and there isn't a minute to be lost."---Wolfgang Mozart, 01.08.1781

 

Yeah.

[SteveMc 2,687]

6 hours ago, Lewya said:

Hearing music from so many films and decades collected together on one recording makes one appreciate the protean nature of Williams’s genius. There is no single “Williams style”.

I think we've kind of established that there are harmonic and structural commonalities even in the most stylistically varied works in Williams's oeuvre, the use of a unique harmonic system that bridges jazz and classical languages, for example.  I wish more people were aware that there is a definite singular style to John's music, that is more subtle than surface style and thus all the more remarkable. 

[Richard P 5,320]

Sounds like Williams expressing more opinions and tidbits about working relationships than usual, although of course still in his utterly diplomatic style.

 

He's never that candid in video/audio interviews. Must be something about text interviews which make him more open,

[Docteur Qui 1,581]

7 hours ago, Lewya said:

With most work in Hollywood suspended during the pandemic, Williams might be forgiven for taking a well-earned break from composition. Not a bit of it. He’s spending his time finishing a violin concerto for Anne-Sophie Mutter, who also features in the Vienna concert playing virtuoso arrangements of his soundtracks (“Harry Potter meets Paganini,” Williams quips). Astonishingly, it will be the 19th concerto or quasi-concerto he has written for the concert hall.

 

If I'm reading that quote correctly as what we can expect from the concerto, this excites me a lot. My favourite arrangements from his collaborations with Mutter so far have been the Potter/Witches of Eastwick ones. Sounds like it'll be right up my alley.

[Marian Schedenig 11,750]

14 minutes ago, Docteur Qui said:

7 hours ago, Lewya said:

With most work in Hollywood suspended during the pandemic, Williams might be forgiven for taking a well-earned break from composition. Not a bit of it. He’s spending his time finishing a violin concerto for Anne-Sophie Mutter, who also features in the Vienna concert playing virtuoso arrangements of his soundtracks (“Harry Potter meets Paganini,” Williams quips). Astonishingly, it will be the 19th concerto or quasi-concerto he has written for the concert hall.

 

If I'm reading that quote correctly as what we can expect from the concerto, this excites me a lot. My favourite arrangements from his collaborations with Mutter so far have been the Potter/Witches of Eastwick ones. Sounds like it'll be right up my alley.

 

That quip clearly refers to the Across the Stars arrangements they performed in Vienna.

[bruce marshall 1,989]

Not surprised to find out he loves Haydn .You can hear him in JW's neo-classical styling!

Great story bout recording SW with LSO!

[ricsim88 334]

Great interview, thanks for sharing. I loved the bit about the rotary trumpets. As a trumpet player myself, I was very curious how Williams’s music would sound on those. I haven’t been disappointed with the few excerpts we’ve heard so far. 

[bruce marshall 1,989]

3 minutes ago, ricsim88 said:

Great interview, thanks for sharing. I loved the bit about the rotary trumpets. As a trumpet player myself, I was very curious how Williams’s music would sound on those. I haven’t been disappointed with the few excerpts we’ve heard so far. 

What's the diff between coronet and trumpet?

[JohnnyD 1,864]

8 hours ago, Lewya said:

He’s not so far away from his tenth decade. Does he ever contemplate hanging up his quill? “Never,” he says. “I will press on. Music isn’t a profession. It’s my oxygen. Take that away and I’d really be in trouble.”

 

A blessing, the Maestro is.

 

Really great interview.

[ricsim88 334]

3 minutes ago, bruce marshall said:

What's the diff between coronet and trumpet?

Do you mean cornet?

The difference is actually not very big. A cornet is conical, meaning it starts getting bigger gradually until it reaches the bell. A trumpet is cylindrical, meaning the tube stays the exact same size until it opens up close to the bell. The trumpets they use in Vienna are completely different. Their valves are closer to those of a french horn. Both the cornet and  the rotary valve trumpet sound darker than a regular trumpet. 

[bruce marshall 1,989]

5 hours ago, Doug Adams said:

That's the last time I get my insider news from Harry Potter fan sites!

You of all people should know better!😁

[TheUlyssesian 2,754]

What an intelligent gracious man.

 

Williams need not only speak through his music. He can speak as a human being too. What he has to say is very interesting and worth listening to.

 

They should officially engage a biographer to interview him for 100s of hours over many years and produce a definitive book about his life and work.

[artguy360 2,237]

7 hours ago, Richard Penna said:

Sounds like Williams expressing more opinions and tidbits about working relationhips than usual, although of course still in his utterly diplomatic style.

 

He's never that candid in video/audio interviews. Must be something about text interviews which make him more open,

The most candid I've ever seen JW be is in his video interview with Andre Previn.

[Docteur Qui 1,581]

8 hours ago, Marian Schedenig said:

 

That quip clearly refers to the Across the Stars arrangements they performed in Vienna.

ok, wasn’t really “clear” to me, but fair enough.

[crumbs 16,069]

16 hours ago, Lewya said:

And I think he might have been interested in film if he’d lived 200 years later, though he probably would have been horrified by having his music drowned out by the noise of spaceships flying past.”

 

Gee, I wonder who this very pointed comment is aimed at?

 

Safe to say Williams won't be rushing to collaborate with Abrams again.

 

16 hours ago, Lewya said:

“And of course there’s huge variety in that species of humanity called film directors. Some are very musical. Others are suspicious of using music at all.”

 

Love this quote, JW's dry humour shines through.

 

16 hours ago, Lewya said:

The orchestra agreed, as long as some sessions could begin at 11pm, after its regular concerts were over.

 

I didn't know this! So some sessions for Star Wars started late at night and ran into the early hours of the morning? Surprised JW agreed to that, although he was far younger at the time (and didn't have the immense clout of his post-SW success by  that point).

[Jurassic Shark 16,456]

3 minutes ago, crumbs said:

I didn't know this! So some sessions for Star Wars started late at night and ran into the early hours of the morning? Surprised JW agreed to that, although he was far younger at the time (and didn't have the immense clout of his post-SW success by  that point).

 

Well, it was a chance for him to record a score with a top orchestra!

[Thor 9,363]

2 hours ago, artguy360 said:

The most candid I've ever seen JW be is in his video interview with Andre Previn.

 

The most candid I've seen him is in an 80s (or maybe it was 70s) interview in a British magazine, where he rags all over PSYCHO and whatnot. It's as if it's a different person.

 

JW interviews were better back in the day; these days it's the same old stuff regurgitated over and over again, and a bunch of general remarks about the artform that don't provide any insight into the man and his works. This interview is no exception.

[Richard P 5,320]

Nowadays everyone just asks the crowd-pleasing, self-answering questions where they're just inviting him to either praise someone he works with or say some 'intellectual' stuff about the writing process.

 

No one dares to ask the provocative or revealing stuff, because he commands too much respect.

[Marian Schedenig 11,750]

2 hours ago, Thor said:

This interview is no exception.

 

I knew you would complain (about this interview and the previous one for the New Yorker). You won't accept a Williams interview as a superfluous retreat unless he talks about The Screaming Woman for half of it and insults other composers for the remaining half.  

3 hours ago, crumbs said:

Gee, I wonder who this very pointed comment is aimed at?

 

Safe to say Williams won't be rushing to collaborate with Abrams again.

 

I wouldn't think the comment about spaceships drowning out the music is aimed about anyone specific. Goldsmith used to complain about sound effects (specifically modern vehicles/weapons) drowning out the score long ago (he used to say it was one of the things he enjoyed about First Knight).

 

3 hours ago, crumbs said:

Love this quote, JW's dry humour shines through.

 

That also seems mostly an non-judgemental observation to me (unless you mean the humourous phrase "that species of humanity called film directors"). Tarantino's stance on film scores for example could certainly be described as "suspicious" insofar as he generally doesn't trust them with his own films (or perhaps doesn't trust himself to coordinate with his composer closely enough to get something that doesn't deviate from his initial vision).

[Thor 9,363]

6 minutes ago, Marian Schedenig said:

 

I knew you would complain (about this interview and the previous one for the New Yorker). You won't accept a Williams interview as a superfluous retreat unless he talks about The Screaming Woman for half of it and insults other composers for the remaining half.  

Ha, ha. Yes, more or less.

[mrbellamy 8,262]

Be honest, at this point you’re just mad every time your name isn’t in the byline!

[crumbs 16,069]

20 minutes ago, Marian Schedenig said:

That also seems mostly an non-judgemental observation to me (unless you mean the humourous phrase "that species of humanity called film directors")

 

I did.

[TheUlyssesian 2,754]

3 hours ago, Thor said:

 

The most candid I've seen him is in an 80s (or maybe it was 70s) interview in a British magazine, where he rags all over PSYCHO and whatnot. It's as if it's a different person.

 

JW interviews were better back in the day; these days it's the same old stuff regurgitated over and over again, and a bunch of general remarks about the artform that don't provide any insight into the man and his works. This interview is no exception.

ALL interviews are boring today, period.
 

The United States has destroyed free speech. Everybody is always on their guard today saying the proper and correct thing and nothing truly provocative or interesting ever slips out.
 

[crumbs 16,069]

 

[Trumpeteer 304]

On 8/6/2020 at 9:32 AM, Lewya said:

Yet some of his most famous scores for Spielberg were recorded not in Hollywood, but in Britain, with the London Symphony Orchestra at Denham or Shepperton studios.

This is an error. Raiders of the Lost Ark was the only Spielberg film that has a score recorded by the LSO. Yes, Close Encounters played bits for the 1980 re-issue, but let's not count that.

[bruce marshall 1,989]

16 hours ago, Richard Penna said:

 

 

No one dares to ask the provocative or revealing stuff, because he commands too much respect.

Right!

Why wasn't he asked which composers were still in the ' closet'?😒

 

 

 

17 hours ago, Thor said:

 

 

JW interviews were better back in the day; these days it's the same old stuff regurgitated over and over again, and a bunch of general remarks about the artform that don't provide any insight into the man and his works. This interview is no exception.

That's because mainstream reporters know little about their subjects. These articles are always passed with endless recitations of awards , nominations and other useless trivia.

Composers like talking to folks who know about what goes into writing music for motion pictures.

I speak here from experience!😊

[Jurassic Shark 16,456]

You better do a proper interview then!

[bruce marshall 1,989]

45 minutes ago, Jurassic Shark said:

You better do a proper interview then!

Just give me his cell and we'll arrange a one-on-one.

Bruce R. Murrow

[Jurassic Shark 16,456]

Telegraph, you mean.

[bruce marshall 1,989]

53 minutes ago, Jurassic Shark said:

Telegraph, you mean.

Beeper.

[Jurassic Shark 16,456]

Pigeon.

[oierem 248]

On 8/6/2020 at 6:32 PM, Lewya said:

 

Even more extraordinary, the LSO had just recruited a new principal trumpet — the soon-to-be-legendary Maurice Murphy. So on his first day in his new job Murphy’s first task was to blast the opening notes of one of the 20th century’s greatest movie melodies.

 

 

This another false anecdote Williams likes to tell. The main title of SW was not the first thing they recorded for SW; in fact, the first cue recorded already featured the main theme.

 

It's like the "15-minute cue at the end of ET" story. Never let reality ruin a good story. 

[Maurizio 6,914]

25 minutes ago, oierem said:

 

This another false anecdote Williams likes to tell. The main title of SW was not the first thing they recorded for SW; in fact, the first cue recorded already featured the main theme.

Williams isn’t lying either—the Main Title was indeed recorded on the first scoring day on March 5, 1977, even if it wasn’t the very first cue of the day (they recorded three other cues before tackling the main title). 
 

The story holds up nonetheless.

[TheUlyssesian 2,754]

2 hours ago, oierem said:

It's like the "15-minute cue at the end of ET" story. Never let reality ruin a good story. 

 

What is he misremembering in that story?

[Jurassic Shark 16,456]

It's actually only one minute.