Why Do They Persist?

[Justin 2]

Since Williams flight from the HP4 project I have seen several comments like this

Williams did fine work on Potter's 1 & 3. William Ross tried his best, but I'd rather see a guy like Doyle write something entirely new than see another composer take the same Williams themes and give them another spin around the block.

There are other comments to that degree but I'm not willing to track them all down. Why do people continue to say that Williams had little or nothing to do with the score for CoS? I thought it was a fairly well known fact that Williams wrote most of the new music in CoS. Why do people continue to sound like Williams had nothing to do with the project. Wasn't there are rumor that Williams "rejected" Ross's original score?

Justin -Who has always been confused by this issue.

[hoby12 0]

I am also confused by this. When I met Bill Ross he said two things:

a) John Williams personally selected him to adapt his music for COS

B) JW ended up writing 45 Minutes of music - all of it was not to picture

So if I assume JW wrote 45 then BR wrote the rest? Anyone know? I know that Bill seemed to even be a little goo goo ga ga over Mr. Williams and the honor of helping him. He siad he did many piano reductions of the HPSS score - which he had a copy. I also looked at a copy of the sketch score for HPCOS - which seemed about 50/50 Williams/Ross. They both composed to the typical JW sketch line paper. But I would like to know what JW wrote and what BR wrote - HPCOS is one of the soundtracks I do not own so I am not as familiar with the score. Who can clear this up?

PS I think the little kids are going to be pissed if hedwig theme doesn't play on the celeste as the film opens. I remember them all whisteling and singing the theme during the last time.

[hoby12 0]

PS: I meant some of it was to picture and some of it wasn't

[John Crichton 4]

The analysis that came up a few months ago says that Williams composed the whole thing. Other sources have said he was heavily involved in the process. One way or another I have no doubt that every note was composed by Williams, some fresh for the film (including the concert pieces), the rest pulled from SS. To make it more confusing some cues have extended versions of SS music (Cornish Pixies), while others start with SS music then transition to new material (Finding Justin, the unreleased The Writing on the Wall). It's a mystery how much Ross actually did other than conduct the orchestra.

[Adam 1]

The comments cited by Ross seem quite odd if true. There?s quite a bit of new music written by JW specific to the picture as well as concert arrangements. Initially I think we all thought Ross was going o be writing music. For whatever reason, this never happened or it happenecd and his music wasn?t used, and all the music was new music by JW or old music from the first HP and a little bit of AOTC thrown in and adapted. Perhaps Ross had a hand in adapting some of this old music, I don?t know. But its pretty clearly all written by JW and the soundtrack is unambiguous in this regard.

I?m not surprised the perception still exists that Ross wrote the music or part of the music since this was a common impression we all had before the the film and not a lot of effort was made to correct people later on.

- Adam

[King Mark 3,631]

From all I've read over the years this is what I think happened:

1)Williams initially wrote 45 minutes of music and Ross wrote the rest as stated in early Williams CoS related interviews

2)For some reason we still don't know Ross music was pulled out and Williams was brought back in at the last minute to re-write the whole thing(1)Ocelot reported this to us that at the time and can be regarded as a reliable source and 2)personally I could never hear anything in the score that might be composed by someone else,and 3)the written score analysis tell us everything was written by Williams).Also,There is no other explanation for AotC music ending up in CoS except a very tired Williams having to work in a rush at the very last minute.

K.M.

[Jeshopk 8]

I am not doubting ocelot, but is he an "insider"? How does he find out these things?...

[hoby12 0]

Well i actually spoke to Mr. Ross and that is what he siad verbatum. I also looked through the score to COS and saw half JW hand half BR hand. I am just trying to figure if the BR stuff was used in the end. And if not maybe he never mentioned that they didn't use it becuase he was somehow embrassed. It could be any of many possibilities. I also know the studio didn't want to credit BR as a co composer which is what JW wanted - they didnt want to credit him at all - the compromise credit was music adapted by - which is a throwback to ancient times.

[King Mark 3,631]

Wait a second,maybe at some point you can explain to us how you get to see Williams hand written scores,and talk to Williams Ross on a personnal basis.What you say indicates that Ross wrote half of the score and that draft probably exists.A few months before the movie was released JW said in an interview he wrote only 45 minutes of music, but the c.d. is longer than this and all JW, plus all the other evidence points to Ross music not making it into the movie.The link Ricard provided to the complete score analysis points out Ross wrote nothing of what ended up as the final score.There's no way Ross would be allowed to use AotC music,this clearly indicates JW had to do some patching up at the last minute.

K.M.

[hoby12 0]

Hmm...still pretty confused. What happened to the BR cues then? Did they even get recorded? Was there some type of confrentation between the two composers? That would have been a sight to see....

[Justin 2]

Well thanks for bringing up all these extra questions guys.

Justin

[Jeshopk 8]

Spill more beans insiders! You wouldn't be faulted for telling this type of info!

[Lurker 5]

I am not doubting ocelot, but is he an "insider"? How does he find out these things?...

He has friends.

Neil

[Luke Skywalker 1,813]

I think he said Warner was not pleased by Ross work so they got Williams again in a rush.

Note that the score says 'adapted and conducted by Williams Ross', not 'Themes by John Williams New Music composed and conducted by William Ross' like in JP III.