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JOHN WILLIAMS (Composer)

John Williams is undoubtedly one of best-known and one of the giants among movie soundtrack composers. He also is one of the most prolific, with at least one film score appearing in a movie each year. His music is well-known and very hummable.

It's entered the consciousness of pop culture: the dum-dum-dum-DUM-DUM beat of the shark attack music in Jaws, or the triumphant fanfare of the main theme from the Star Wars movies.

"Riffs (are) ... a good way of putting it," he told TotalFilm of these signature melodies. "A snippet of melodic identification for a character for a character, or a fish, or a spaceship, can fill in the tapestry and create memory triggers throughout the 16 reels of film that can be pushed from time to time."

John Towner Williams grew up in a musical world, raised in a family of four boys and one girl. He was born on 8 February 1932 in the Flushing section of Queens in New York City. His father was a jazz drummer, playing in the Randolph Scott Quintet and in NBC and CBS radio ensembles. Williams began to study the piano at age 7 and also learned the trumpet, trombone and clarinet.

The family movied to California in 1948, where Williams' father was a freelancer for movie orchestras, including 20th Century Fox. They lived in an oceanside home in Culver City. Through his dad's work at Fox, Williams saw the movie world up close -- his sister attended Shirley Temple's birthday parties.

Williams graduated from North Hollywood High School in 1950, where he had played, composed and arranged music for the band. Williams enrolled at the University of California at Los Angeles, studying piano and composition. He also received private lessons from composer Bobby Van Eps. His first composition was at age 19.

Williams served with the U.S. Air Force during the Korean War, doing composing and arranging for military bands. In 1954, he entered the prestigious Juilliard School of Music, New York, to study piano. He worked in nightclubs and later worked for composer Alfred Newman at 20th Century Fox and in singer Vic Damone's band.

Williams' first movie credit was Because They're Young (1960). He did 14 scores in all in the 1960s, including Diamond Head and How to Steal a Million. He also composed for television, writing all the theme songs for producer Irwin Allen's cheap late 1960s sci-fi shows: Lost in Space, Time Tunnel and Land of the Giants.

Williams did numerous other TV shows, including Playhouse 90, Wagon Train and yes, Gilligan's Island. Williams won two Emmys for his TV film score work.

He is quite well-known for scoring every Steven Spielberg movie but The Color Purple, beginning with The Sugarland Express in 1974. Other Spielberg movies with a Williams soundtrack are Jaws, the Indiana Jones trilogy, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Jurassic Park I and II, E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, Schindler's List and Saving Private Ryan.

Williams also has partnered repeatedly with George Lucas, provding music for all of the Star Wars movies. Lucas also produced the Indiana Jones movies.

Williams served as conductor of the Boston Pops Orchestra from 1980 -- replacing the late, beloved Arthur Fiedler -- to 1993. At times, he conducted his own works at concerts. He also was the composer of numerous serious non-movie works, such as symphonies and concertos. The NBC News theme is also his work. He resigned from the Boston Symphony to devote more attention to movie scores.

He has received 36 Academy Award nominations, receving his first Oscar for Fiddler on the Roof in 1972. The second Oscar was four years later for Jaws. Other Oscars were for Stars Wars: Episode IV -- A New Hope (1977), E.T. (1982), and Schindler's List (1993). For the 74th Academy Awards, Williams was doubly honored with nominations A.I. Artificial Intelligence and The Sorcerer's Stone. Williams also has received numerous Grammy and Golden Globe awards for best soundtracks.

His association with Chris Columbus began with Home Alone in 1990, followed by its sequel in 1992. Other movies not by Spielberg, Lucas or Columbus include Sabrina, Seven Years in Tibet, The Patriot and Angela's Ashes. Besides Sorcerer's Stone in 2001, he also scored Spielberg's A.I. -- Artificial Intelligence.

Williams' slate for 2002 and 2003 is packed: The Chamber of Secrets and The Prisoner of Azkaban; Star Wars: Episode II -- Attack of the Clones (with the London Symphony, a frequent collaborator); and two by Spielberg -- Minority Report (with Tom Cruise) and Catch Me If You Can (with Leonardo DiCaprio).

Williams has been hailed for bright, lush music that sticks in viewers' minds, but he has acknowledged it's not easy. He said in a 1975 New York Times interview, "Film scoring may be very rewarding, but it's also agony. Film composers are not their own masters. They are working for corporations. You accept that as part of the job."

Williams was married to Barbara for 18 years, who died of a cerebral hemorrhage in 1974. He was remarried in 1980 to photographer Samantha Winslow. His sons, Joseph and Mark, are musicians, and his daughter, Jennifer, is a physician.

Williams was happy to take on The Sorcerer's Stone because J.K. Rowling's work had multi-generational appeal in his family. "I have grandchildren who read them (the Harry Potter books) and love them. I have children who read them and love them. In my family, there are three generations of American people enjoying Rowling," he told The Times of London.

Williams said that his score for Sorcerer's Stone was to be, naturally, "theatrical, magical and to capture a child's sense of wonder in the world."

Williams recorded the soundtrack in mid 2001 with an orchestra of studio musicians at the famed Abbey Road Studios and AIR Lyndhurst Studios in London. Abbey Road's Studio 2 is renowned as the place where the Beatles recorded from 1962-1969. Williams probably used Studio 1, a 4,876-square-foot room that can accomodate an orchestra and a 120-voice choir. He recorded The Phantom Menace and Raiders of the Lost Ark there. AIR Lyndhurst is owned by Sir George Martin, often called the "Fifth Beatle" and producer of their albums.

The soundtrack was released 30 November 2001 in the United States and United Kingdom. In the U.S. it is on Atlantic Records.

Here is a list of the individual tracks on the Sorcerer's Stone CD:

1. Prologue
2. The Arrival of Baby Harry
3. Visit to the Zoo and Letters from Hogwarts
4. Diagon Alley and The Gringotts Vault
5. Platform Nine-and-Three-Quarters and The Journey to Hogwarts
6. Entry into the Great Hall and The Banquet
7. Mr. Longbottom Flies
8. Hogwarts Forever! and The Moving Stairs
9. The Norwegian Ridgeback and A Change of Season
10. The Quidditch Match
11. Christmas at Hogwarts
12. The Invisibility Cloak and The Library Scene
13. Fluffy's Harp
14. In the Devil's Snare and The Flying Keys
15. The Chess Game
16. The Face of Voldemort
17. Leaving Hogwarts
18. Harry's Wondrous World
19. Hedwig's Theme

Hear samples of the CD at Harry Potter Soundtrack.

A Review

I'm not a music critic, but I will put in my two cents in about this latest soundtrack from one of Hollywood's most prolific music men.

By starting to listen, you can just tell that this is a Williams soundtrack. The soaring, flying music, and the repeated little sounds, such as the tinkling celesta heard at the beginning of the movie trailers, are all here. Williams strives to capture the Harry Potter fantasy aspect, and he is successful. Sometimes he recycles himself from previous films.

Williams also has a thing for French horns. They're back again, announcing scenes of great adventure or flight. They appear in "Harry's Wondrous World" (Track #2) and in "The Quidditch Match" (#11).

At times you hear tunes that are reminiscent of previous Williams work. "Harry's Wondrous World" reminded me of parts of E.T., especially the music when Henry Thomas flies across the moon with the alien in his bicycle basket, or the end. "Platform Nine and Three Quarters and The Journey to Hogwarts (#6), sometimes sounds like the trick or treating scene from E.T., when all the kids are out in costume. And again on "The Norwegian Ridgeback and A Change of Season" (#10) the Halloween youngsters scene kept coming to mind.

"The Arrival of Baby Harry" recalls "Duel of the Fates" from The Phantom Menace, complete with the chorus. This deja vu is even stronger because London Voices, the group that performed for the Star Wars, film, also does singing duty for The Sorcerer's Stone.

The celesta, a keyboard instrument resembling a piano that produces bell sounds, tinkles in the prologue and near the end in "Hedwig's Theme" (#19). This sound is reminiscent of Hook. Randy Kerber, a veteran session keyboardist, does the solos.

Standout tracks include "The Quidditch Match," with its sports day/Roman Colisseum opening section, and the sharp blasts of brass as the house rivals go at it on the pitch. "The Face of Voldemort" (#17) also contains a lot of great menace and terror as Harry finds out Professor Quirrell's true nature.

"Hedwig's Theme" was the first track to be released, and excerpts appear in other selections. It's catchy -- it sounds like an owl flying wildly with a message or package for her owner, her flight paralleling antics on a Quidditch broom. It may stay in your head after listening to it a few time. Someday it could be Boston Pops' playlist (Williams is a former conductor and still comes back for guest appearances).

The opening of "Diagon Alley and The Gringotts Vault" is amusing, a little Elizabethan sounding folk song that mirrors production designer Stuart Craig's "Ye Olde London" set. Williams also provides a fun satire of an old university song that opens "Hogwarts Forever! and The Moving Stairs (#9). It has a little bit of clashing in the chords, suggesting the chaos that Dumbledore unleashed when he told everyone to sing it however they wanted.

The strangest track has to be "Christmas at Hogwarts (#12), with the London Voices singing "Merry, Merry Christmas ... it's Christmas Day..." over and over at the beginning like a group of wandering Victorian carolers. (You must see it in context in the movie -- it is actually voices of ghosts walking down a corridor and caroling.) A melody suggesting sleighing through the countryside opens it -- in other words, familiar Yuletide type music and then weird voices.

The Sorcerers' Stone is a listenable work. It won't be up there with Raiders of the Lost Ark, Jaws or E.T., but it contributes to the film.

Featured Musicians:

RANDY KERBER plays the celesta solos on the soundtrack. He is veteran session keyboardist who has played with numerous rock and pop stars, including Eric Clapton, John Lennon, Rickie Lee Jones, Leonard Cohen and Anita Baker. His prolific soundtrack work includes The Phantom Menace with Williams and Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas and Titanic with James Horner, and Toy Story with Randy Newman.

MARCIA CRAYFORD, a British violinist, is the concertmistress. Crayford was admitted to the Yehudi Menuhin School at age 14, where she studied with him and violnist Nadia Boulanger. She made her solo debut at age 15 at the Royal Festival Hall. Crayford studied at the Royal Academy of Music and in 1988 was named a fellow of the academy for her accomplishments in music. Crayford was the leader of the England-based Nash Ensemble for 25 years, touring internationally. After leaving the Nash group in 1995, Crayford joined the London Symphony Orchestra, where she led the LSO Chamber Ensemble and received a standing ovation for her performance with Williams on his Schindler's List soundtrack.

The LONDON VOICES are led by TERRY EDWARDS and have appeared on numerous soundtracks, including An American Tail, The Mission and Cutthroat Island. The chorus has performed with opera greats Luciano Pavorotti and Placido Domingo, as well as recordings of Broadway classics, such as My Fair Lady and On The Town. EMI Records also selected the group to perform on its opera recordings, including La Boheme and Rondine.

Edwards studied with the London Chorus. He sang bass and eventually managed the John Aldis and Schutz Choir. He founded London Voices in 1973. He also is director of the Royal Opera House and London Sinfonietta choruses.