Jump to content

John Williams Writes New Theme for ESPN College Football Championship - OF GRIT AND GLORY


DangerMotif

Recommended Posts

In the 'collective unconscious' Williams's triumphant brass sound is so easily identifiable with American culture at this point, that if you put it over an American national sporting event, it appears to fit like a glove. As if it had always been there.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Disco Stu said:

Oh no, they're going to have annoying crowd noise and commentators all over the music.  Ugh, I hoped it would be more classy than that.  The session had better leak.

 well, what did I say a few posts ago? Of course they're going to find a way to mess it up and we'll only hear bits and pieces of it over crowd noises and sound effects

 

I mean what did you expect, studio recordings of all the variations on Day 1 ? This never happens with this type of piece . We don't even have clean recordings of Dear Baskettball and the various Olympic fanfare variations. The Boston pops think they gave us a great gift with a 96 kbps MP3 of Fenway Fanfare

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, Disco Stu said:

Oh no, they're going to have annoying crowd noise and commentators all over the music.  Ugh, I hoped it would be more classy than that.  The session had better leak.

 

My hope is that the mix in the actual video will be better than that little clip. But yeah, the music definitely won't be clean unfortunately.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, King Mark said:

 well, what did I say a few posts ago? Of course they're going to find a way to mess it up and we'll only hear bits and pieces of it over crowd noises and sound effects

 

I mean what did you expect, studio recordings of all the variations on Day 1 ? This never happens with this type of piece . We don't even have clean recordings of Dear Baskettball and the various Olympic fanfare variations. The Boston pops think they gave us a great gift with a 96 kbps MP3 of Fenway Fanfare

 

Well I was hopeful about the full "inspirational" video presentation of the theme, which is not something they did for the NFL theme back in the 2000s that I remember.

 

This part:

Quote

Titled “Of Grit and Glory,” it runs three and a half minutes and will score a specially created series of visuals that convey “the feeling behind the night, fear and anticipation, triumph and failure,” ESPN co-director and producer Martin Khodabakhshian tells Variety.

 

I was hopeful that it might be mostly just images set to music, relatively clean.  But from the clip, it seems that it'll be lots of noise and commentary.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's clear in the tweet that the commentary playing over the music was spliced from the TCU and Georgia games that got them to the championship. I find it hard to imagine that the announcers for tomorrow's game already recorded their introductory remarks when that kind of thing has always been done live. On the other hand, I don't know if ESPN's producers believe even a rousing new piece of music by JW can keep American college football audiences' attention for 3 minutes without the help of Chris Fowler's booming voice telling us how we got here, so I don't know what to expect.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 minutes ago, Bayesian said:

It's clear in the tweet that the commentary playing over the music was spliced from the TCU and Georgia games that got them to the championship. I find it hard to imagine that the announcers for tomorrow's game already recorded their introductory remarks when that kind of thing has always been done live. On the other hand, I don't know if ESPN's producers believe even a rousing new piece of music by JW can keep American college football audiences' attention for 3 minutes without the help of Chris Fowler's booming voice telling us how we got here, so I don't know what to expect.

I think it is highly probable that this piece is released cleanly as a single on youtube and probably within the week.  The bumpers and such will not be, and they may never be played again--so, grab'em on Monday.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Garrett said:

Is the inspirational video set to the theme? Or is the theme set to the inspirational video?

Sounds a Euthyphro problem.

 

Yes, Jay is likely right.  The article says it the other way around, but that has to be a mistake.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Maybe they gave him a tentative collection of clips as a sort of temp and then reedited upon completion of the piece.  I doubt they would have begged Williams and then put heavy contraints on his composition.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If they went to the expense and effort to record it with a huge orchestrs then you'd think there's no better way to generate hype and get people excited than to release it as a single.

 

On the other hand we know from experience that people in charge of marketing in big corporations know bugger all about score music, so expecting someone to think 'hey, why not release this?' may be optimistic.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, Will said:

Definitely wouldn't rule out this being released digitally as a single soon. (IIRC the Obi-Wan theme was released as a single with no advance announcement.)

This is believed to be the largest-scale musical commission ever for the sports network. What will happen with the piece after Monday night is not clear. ESPN could theoretically use it in future college football broadcasts; no plans for a commercial release have apparently been discussed.“

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Tom said:

Two Williams's fanfarish concert pieces forthcoming in the next few days.  Not a bad way to begin 2023.  

 

You're referring to this plus the Vienna fanfare?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 06/01/2023 at 11:05 AM, Jay said:

 

Wow!

Wow!!

Wow!!!

Wow!!!!

..........................Wow!!!!!!

 

 

Yeah yeah yeah!

image.png

 

 

 

 

What an exciting way to start the year! I guess I have to watch some football. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

TIL Monday Night Football is exclusive to ESPN now, and not available over the antennae on ABC like the good ole days

 

I guess I can't watch it live

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Disco Stu said:

I imagine the video will air near the beginning of the broadcast before the game even starts, so if you don't enjoy football I bet you won't have to watch any.

What about the cutdowns, stingers, and vamps that JW recorded? You probably will have to watch the game if you want to hear everything.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Andy said:

What are these sports of which you speak?  

 

Ah, yes, a common question: a sport is a story with a humorous climax.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Disco Stu said:

Well this is the college National Championship, not Monday Night Football (which is pro football), but yeah it is exclusive to the cable channel.  I have it via YouTube TV.

 

So it won't be on ESPN+?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, Disco Stu said:

Oh it might be, I don't know anything about ESPN+ or how it works

 

I don't either, I literally just realized that I had it last night since it's part of the Disney/Hulu bundle.

 

Anyone know what game/time it's going to be? There's like a million games listed on here and I don't know which one to click on...

EDIT: Nevermind, reread the article.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just now, Manakin Skywalker said:

 

I don't either, I just realized that I had it last night since it's part of the Disney/Hulu bundle.

 

Anyone know what game/time it's going to be? There's like a million games listed on here and I don't know which one to click on...

 

The pre-game officially starts at 7 and the game at 7:30.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just now, Manakin Skywalker said:

 

I don't either, I literally just realized that I had it last night since it's part of the Disney/Hulu bundle.

 

Anyone know what game/time it's going to be? There's like a million games listed on here and I don't know which one to click on...

Usually games shown on ESPN aren't included on ESPN+. However, when I googled it, some articles are saying that it will be shown on ESPN+.
 

https://sportsnaut.com/how-to-watch-college-football-national-championship/

 

https://espnpressroom.com/us/press-releases/2023/01/espn-set-for-extensive-on-site-studio-coverage-in-los-angeles-surrounding-the-college-football-playoff-national-championship-presented-by-att/

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Guidelines.