Page 1 of John Williams - THE King of Movie Music..

...And of course you may already know that :)

Why am i posting this here? Well having splashed on a totally new set up consisting of a stunning Marantz 7200 Class A stereo amp, 4300 Reciever, (for centre/rear/rearcentre duties and PL2/Neo 6 enhancement) and lovely Mission 780 SE`s for the front speakers with a nice MJ Pro50 sub i thought i`d treat myself to the 4 disc set of JW`s 40 years of film music.

Ok, so James Horner/Danny Elfman and others all do it well too, but you simply cannot deny that John Williams really does know how to turn on the magic with the music, and the quality of the recording here is simply stunning - when i pressed the class A button on the Marantz it put a massive smile on my chops the width of Britain! The classic tones of Star Wars, Indy, Jurassic Park, and others all sound amazing, and cause it`s been mastered in Dolby Surround, a bit of Pro Logic 2 makes it sound truly amazing and i love it.

I strongly urge anyone who loves movie music to get a copy, simply awesome listening.

So there you go, Westy`s pointless babble, now officialy over... :D


Westy

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I saw this in WH Smiths and was very tempted, but have been dissapointed with the quality of some soundtrack compiliations in the past. If it is as good as you say it is, Westy, I may have to ask Santa for it.

Nick

Check Out 365 live Internet Radio Station . Here there is a wide range of movie soundtrack Radio stations playing 24 / 7 and it`s free .

I`d love to see him live, always doing concerts in the USA never seems to do them over here..... :/

is it actually him and his orchestra playin, or is it somebody else conducting his music. The reason I asked is that when I bought Superman, I thought it would be John Williams conducting but it wasn`t it was someone else, I felt conned to be honest.

floyd
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What does Alan Silvestri`s stuff sound like on it Westy?

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If it`s the CD set I`m thinking of, then no. It`s the City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra
(probably quite good, but certainly not the Czech Philharmonic, and are much cheaper to hire than the LSO who play many of JW`s scores on the soundtracks, and the Crouch End festival Chorus - one of London`s superior amateur choirs, and conducted by Paul Bateman, Nic Raine and Mario Klemens (who, even after several years of being a freelance violinist myself, I`ve never heard of)). Mind you, some of the best film score CDs out at the moment are re-recordings of old scores thought to have been lost and lose nothing from being performed and conducted by different people. Of course, if you`re so used to the music on the film itself then different speeds (and sometimes, instrumentation) can be offputting when it`s been arranged / conducted by someone other than those who did the original recordings.

Incidentally, purely for musical interest, if anyone wants to hear much of the music which influenced John Williams, they can do worse that get their hands on the complete symphonies of Mahler and Shostakovitch (the 6th symphonies of each, funnily enough, containing some of Williams` best material :-) )


My collection

This item was edited on Monday, 24th November 2003, 13:45

Sounds very interesting. I think I`ll have to invest in a copy!

I just love the Jurassic Park theme tune!

Have to agree, Williams is a great film composer, but personally feel his golden years really were when he composed the likes of Jaws, Close Encounters, Superman, Star Wars, Empire, Jedi, Raiders and ET. Saying that, Duel of the Fates was somewhat of a return to form.

He has done concerts over here, and what`s more, with the LSO. In fact he`s played cues from most of the above.

I didn`t realise those new discs were in Dolby Surround. I think the isolated score on the Superman DVD is in 5.1. What with albums now turning up on DVD audio in DD and DTS, just imagine what this kind of orchestral music would sound like...mmmmmmmm.

Shenk

This item was edited on Monday, 24th November 2003, 15:10

Quote:
What does Alan Silvestri`s stuff sound like on it Westy?

RJS, not sure if you mean on the CD or on my stereo! There`s no Silvestri stuff on the discs, obviously, but i`d love you to hear some of his stuff on the new set up - LAWKS!!!

I gave the score from the Mummy Returns a spin - if only for it`s savage bass content and stunning recording quality and i must admit to being quite stunned. I`d never cared much for scores before but the more i hear, the more i love listening to them. Some of the BTTF stuff and also What Lies Beneath sound sweet too.

And to answer some of the the other questions here, (as well as back up Mr Titheringtons fine comments - cheers! ;) ), no it`s not THE John Williams, but the orchestrations and production are simply amazing - believe me i don`t say that lightly.

It`s been encoded in HDCD too, so if your CD player can do it and you amp is good enough, set your ears to stun - the results in Pro Logic 2 were very creative too, pure immersion, man!!

For £14.99 and 4 top quality discs you really can`t go wrong - it`s all the classics as well. Well, apart from some Harry Potter and Episode1&2 tagged on the end :D

Westy

Site Technical Help Editor and Moderator

Home Cinema Editor - Area450

My YMDB favourite list

My DVD Profiler list

Got a Question? Enter the mind of Westy

Send Nochex/Paypal to; 2TSEWD[at]TEN.EGNARO