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John Williams Feature on MSNBC About Mission Theme


Saxbabe

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Nice interview with him talking about the Mission, and footage of the recording- great stuff with him rehearsing the orchestra!

It's comes on at 40 minutes into Hardball on MSNBC, it replays again tonight. Don't miss it. So cool for them to do a little feature on him and high time. Lasted about 5 minutes or so.

After the commercial- a "special" performance of the Mission theme all the way through. Maybe we'll get to see him conduct it? I hope...

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OK, there's a Hardball on at 10 Central (11 Eastern, 4 AM default board time), and again at 1 AM Central, 7 AM Board time. Those with TV recording capabilities on their PCs go nuts! The special really was great, lots of Williams conducting and interacting with the orchestra.

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Wow, awesome! The FULL video that we had seen a small clip of on the MSNBC in Oct. Beautiful shots of the orchestra. So glad they showed this!!

Great shots of him conducting and talking about the Mission theme.

They sounded amazing. Like their performance of it. Arrangement is the same it seems, but performance differs some (from Fanfares and Themes concert version).

Kudos to MSNBC for having this on.

Hardball replays at 11pmET and 1AMET, but it's only the LATE edition it seems. About 40 minutes in. I'm going to digitally record the audio.

I don't have digital vid capability, but I REALLY hope someone does and can record it. I got it on VHS, which isn't so hot.

KM-It's not broadcast on the net, there was a small clip they put up last month, but it was only like 1 minute. This was about ten minutes including the Mission Theme performance.

http://hardball.msnbc.com

Wednesday, 7 p.m. ET: Locked in a deadly battle with insurgents, how much longer will coalition troops need to support Iraq's inexperienced police force to secure lasting peace?

Wednesday, 9 p.m. ET: Hardball has a special tribute for NBC News Anchor Tom Brokaw, who will be signing off today.

So, only the LAST replay will be it, the show was a tribute to Tom Brokaw.

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LATE replay- MSNBC - HARDBALL SPECIAL EDITION - Tribute to Tom Brokaw

2AM Eastern (1AM Central, 11PM Pacific, 7AM Board Time)

(I had been looking at my time zone earlier)

John Crichton - You're in TX too? Cool. I think you're about 6 hours from me :-)

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Again,how does one get to see Hardball?

K.M.

MSNBC is a cable channel. If you can get it in the Etheral Plane, *shrug*.

John Crichton - You're in TX too? Cool. I think you're about 6 hours from me :-)

Cool, knew there had to be at least one other JW Fan here. :wave: Six hours, that would put you either in extreme West Texas or down on the Gulf Coast.

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The second segment was a performance of the original version.

:wave:

Can you be a little more descriptive.To me the "original" version is the 2 minute 1985 recording on the NBC music bootleg

K.M.

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Well,why did Williams bother re-recording this for the 3rd time when there's still unreleased works from him.

K.M.Who once crossed Texas by car and got a speeding ticket

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It's a rerecord of the original arrangement, because of it being the 20th anniversary and so they could do it with the latest digital technology etc. He talks about how he was pleased when NBC called him up and said they wanted to rerecord it.

It is the arrangement from the 1985 bootleg, I listened to them both back to back. The performance is a little different.

The main difference is the slower tempo. Little more lyrical as opposed to crisp and urgent. And the very end, he conducts that slightly different, the run to the last note has a slight ritardando as opposed to pushing straight through to the last note.

I haven't heard American Journey, is it performed the same as the 1985 boot?

John - Yep, on the Gulf Coast, between Beaumont and Port Arthur. :-)

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Still,what's the point of all this,since they only only use the same 10 second snippet for the last 10 years.

You only have the Fanfares and Themes bootleg?I somehow got a clean recording from an NBC promo c.d. that also has the Meet the Press theme

What I do need is a clean sounding version of Scherzo for Today and Fugue for the Changing Times.

K.M.Wondering why Williams just didn't write a new NBC news theme altogheter.

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I've got it on (finally found the damn channel), and am awaiting the Williams feature. At least they're playing the theme throughout the program.

Ray Barnsbury

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They rerecorded The Pulse of Events too, that what they were showing clips of when showing the recording session...guess they probably rerecorded the bumpers and stuff too.

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Josh500 - what a beautiful place you live in...well, at least you'll get to hear the audio :wave:

I have the audio files up at...

http://g-brannan.tripod.com/williams.htm

Not much bandwidth there, probably will have to right-click and Save As.

They are larger than usual because I bumped up the bitrate to help quality but it didn't matter because MSNBC has only a so-so quality feed that is softer than most stations.

Neat to hear the interview, though, even there's not digital video ;)

And to begin the piece, he goes "1, 2, 3, speak!" Neat.

It's so rare we get to see him on something anymore, you know. Can't wait until the Kennedy Center Honors.

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I stayed up late and made video files for both of the John Williams segments featured on Hardball:

POST EDITED BY MODERATOR

PLEASE DO NOT POST DIRECT LINKS TO FILES

Enjoy!

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I' m not clear on this Neil. Why can we keep the link to the audio file up, but not the video?

Thanks, saxbabe, by the way. I enjoyed listening to the theme.

Jeff -- who doesn't have cable anyway

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I' m not clear on this Neil. Why can we keep the link to the audio file up, but not the video?

Thanks, saxbabe, by the way. I enjoyed listening to the theme.

Jeff -- who doesn't have cable anyway

Apparently, because saxbabe did not link directly to the files, but to a page where the files are placed.

- Marc, who enjoyed both the video interview and the new mp3 (yay! high bitrate!) :P

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He sounds rather hoarse. Nice clips, he seems to even have developed a new theme around the piece!

Morlock- who's learned that when there's a will, there's a way.

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I' m not clear on this Neil. Why can we keep the link to the audio file up, but not the video?

Apparently, because saxbabe did not link directly to the files, but to a page where the files are placed.

Ooops! My bad. :oops:

I've put the two video clips up at http://members.cox.net/thx99/williams.htm.

Now, enjoy!

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HOLY CRAPS,he DID record a BEAUTIFUL new theme.It plays in the background of the interview on the trombones.That's the one he's showed practicing.We need this.

Plus,there is a second new theme,we hear 2 seconds of it on strings at 1:34 of the "interview" part(before cutting into Meet the Press),and at the very end before the commercial.

We better be on the lookout for a complete version of this,for whatever it will be used.

And for clarification,The Mission is note for note the By Request/American Journey versionmbut right now ILm really pissed off we didn't get the complete NEW theme.

K.M.Wondering why any JWfan can't immediately pick this up

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I was pretty ecstatic when I heard that new music too, KM. I love his NBC stuff, and the fact that he's added to it makes me very happy. Agreed, we must hear a complete version of this.

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aargh,and that new music has "IT",the kind of JW music you'd want to play over and over again just by hearing a few seconds of it.I must say JW looks on top of his game.This is looking up for RotS and WotW.

K.M.

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From the interview, he mentioned he:

"was thrilled when the people at NBC said would you like to record it again, as a kind of, an anniversary gesture, and also to, develop some of the materials to have some new, little signature things, that are, in some cases are entirely new, and in other cases, that employ what I think of, sort of, as the NBC News Call Note as in the Mission Theme.

I knew some of that must be new when I heard things I didn't recognize, but didn't want to mention it and get anyone too excited until you could hear it for yourselves and weigh in.

I could have recorded it at even a higher bitrate (my mp3 player goes to 320 kbps), but I didn't want to make the file TOO large. ;) Still would've been those darn little pops every so often from their feed.

thx99- Thanks SO MUCH. I was worried those outside the US would not get to see the video. :P

How I would love to see a Williams rehearsal in person. Those that have, are very lucky!

Seeing this reminded me of how BADLY there needs to be a Williams documentary made. All there needs to be is someone to step forward to do it, they'd make their money back ten times over!

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That was a great little tribute to Williams there

2 things:

1-They should show it on network NBC sometime for it to mean anything.

2-they SHOULD have included a clip of Harry Potter in the montage to illustrate that's he's STILL scoring huge movies and didn't stop with JP.

K.M.

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Yes, I too was somewhat disappointed to find the new music that was played in the first part, did not re-appear in the second video. :(

What's the point of letting people hear the old version in an item about how he's done a new one?

Oh, and did the term "digitally remastered" seem out of place to anyone else too? Do they even know what that means? :thumbup:

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And since only The Mission has made it to an official c.d. in 20 years,you can bet we ain't getting this new theme any time soon.They'll probably play a few seconds of it at the end of some news special from time to time(I never even heard more than 10 seconds of The Mission on the air),so we'll have to piece it togheter.Unless someone who works at NBC can get the music...

K.M.

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At 2:47 into the video clip for Part 1, there is a close-up of the sheet music, seen through the strings of a harp. Although it's impossible to read in the .WMV file, I went back to my S-VHS tape and was able to make out "Brokaw #2 (Horns)". Interestingly enough, the audio heard underneath this scene is the wonderful theme which King Mark and others have referred to above.

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