The Best Film Composer Of All Time

Thanks Con! I haven't seen The Village myself yet, but I am definitely familiar with that great score! For my penultimate round I wanted to show how John Williams scores moments of happiness, excitement and amazement. While there are definitely many scores to choose from, I have decided to go with Jurassic Park, another film by Stephen Spielberg, released in 1993. While the score didn't receive as many awards as other Williams' scores, possibly because he was competing against himself and Schindler's List for many of the awards, I nonetheless think that this score is one of John Williams' greatest works. The Third Piece Jurassic Park has two very notable themes, both of which are heard in "Welcome To Jurassic Park" (YouTube link: ). The first theme is known as the main theme of the film, heard in many cues throughout the series. The second theme is often heard when the main characters are travelling, and I will refer to it as the journey theme. The piece starts with a piano playing the beginning of the main theme. Normally, it is performed by a full orchestra, but here the piano gives a unique and delicate dream-like feeling to the start of the piece, which I think is a very beautiful effect. After a while we hear other instruments join in to play the main theme, which continually develops until 01:58, when we start to hear the theme in its usual form and orchestration. The main theme is often heard during scenes where the characters watch live dinosaurs in complete amazement, unable to believe their own eyes at what they are seeing. I think that this emotion is very effectively conveyed musically. The tonic of the piece is repeatedly emphasized through the continuous downwards-upwards movement we hear, resulting in a feeling of fixation and even obsession that results from the joy and excitement of seeing live dinosaurs. The piece is probably one of the most "happy" pieces that John Williams has ever written, lacking minor chords within its harmony. After a short variation of the theme (03:21), we hear a horn (03:38) and piano (03:58) playing the theme, again, giving us a surreal, dream-like feeling. It seems as if the piece is about to end, but we soon realize that this ending isn't real as the orchestra suddenly joins in to play the journey theme (04:26). The journey theme features Williams' signature heroic, upward melodic jumps, giving the listener a feeling of magnificence and grandeur, symbolizing the awesome island of the dinosaurs. We can see that it couples very well with the main theme, symbolizing the dinosaurs themselves. The journey theme is restated several times, featuring different melodic variations and orchestration, until it finally culminates and resolves into an ending (06:13-06:34). Finally, the main theme from the beginning of the piece is heard again, played by a piano in a similar fashion as before (06:37). The piece ends in a very peculiar way (07:14), with a duo of piano and horn (possibly baritone, but don’t quote me on that), which gives a feeling of secrecy and even menace, hinting at the possible dangers of the island. This works very well as a contrast to an otherwise happy piece. Summary of the Third Piece We could clearly hear the two parts of this piece – the first featuring the main theme of the film, and the second featuring the journey theme. Both of those themes work very well in tandem to introduce us to the beautiful island and its amazing inhabitants – the dinosaurs. Between those themes we could hear many musical ideas, bridging and gluing the piece together. Ultimately, however, I think that the piano is the star of this piece, appearing at the beginning, middle and the end to crown those themes in a dreamlike mood, telling us of how the film characters really felt like while being on the island and seeing what no one has ever seen before. John Williams has revealed that the film themes were inspired by dinosaur noises and motion that he observed while he was at Skywalker Ranch where the movie was produced. This is why these themes fit so well with the movie, having been composed by matching "the rhythmic gyrations of the dinosaurs", which led to "these kind of funny ballets", as Williams himself put it. Stephen Spielberg also praised the work of John Williams, revealing that he would listen to it daily as he travelled to the film sets. Personally, I have always considered the soundtrack of Jurassic Park to be a masterpiece of film music composition. If I had the opportunity, I would've definitely shown you more of the cool musical moments in the film, but I hope that "Welcome To Jurassic Park" will be enough to rouse your interest for further exploration on your own. Thanks for listening this round! Over to Con.