Tag: John Williams
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On Music: Meet My Latest Musical Find – ‘Spotlight on John Williams’
Hi, there, Dear Reader. It’s early afternoon here in Lithia, Florida on Tuesday, December 28, 2021. It is a warm winter day in the Sunshine State. Currently, the temperature is 77˚F (25˚C) under partly sunny skies. With humidity at 66% and the wind blowing from the south-southwest at 7 MPH (12 KM/H), the feels-like temperature…
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A Writer’s Tale: Of Names and Songs
Many years ago, when I still lived in Miami, Florida, I wrote a short story which was both a coming-of-age tale and also a look at an older man who must re-examine his youthful choices after a tragic incident kills his high school “crush.” As Reunion’s summary reads on the back cover and on its…
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Movie Review: ‘Black Sunday’ (1977)
Black Sunday (1977) Written by: Ernest Lehman, Kenneth Ross, and Ivan Moffat Directed by: John Frankenheimer Starring: Bruce Dern, Martha Keller, Robert Shaw, Fritz Weaver On March 11, 1977, nearly a quarter of a century before Al Qaeda’s horrifying attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, a relatively small…
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Music Album Review: ‘By Request…: The Best of John Williams and the Boston Pops Orchestra’
In 1987, the Dutch record label Philips Records[1] (Philips Phonographische in Dutch) released By Request…: The Best of John Williams and the Boston Pops Orchestra, a compilation album featuring 12 themes or overtures, two “special events” fanfares, and one television theme[2] composed by Oscar and Grammy Award-winning composer conductor John Williams. At the time of…
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Book Review: ‘The Complete Making of Indiana Jones: The Definitive Story Behind All Four Films’
This film could very easily not be a hit. All films are a risk. I mean, there’s no way to know. You can’t predict a hit.” – George Lucas, on Raiders of the Lost Ark, 1981 On May 20, 2008, Del Rey Books – an imprint of Ballantine Books, a division of Penguin Random House…
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On Music: My Top 10 John Williams ‘Star Wars’ Themes
I have been a fan of John Williams’ symphonic scores ever since I saw the original Star Wars – aka Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope – in the autumn of 1977[1] For me, Williams’ swashbuckling, neo-Romantic themes and action cues sold the rest of George Lucas’s out-of-this-world space-fantasy about “a boy, a girl,…
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On Music: Happy 89th Birthday, John Williams!
John Williams “So much of what we do is ephemeral and quickly forgotten, even by ourselves, so it’s gratifying to have something you have done linger in people’s memories.” Hi, there, Dear Reader! It’s early afternoon here in New Hometown, Florida on Monday, February 8, 2021. Currently, the temperature is 75˚F (24˚C) under cloudy skies;…
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Music Album Review: ‘Saving Private Ryan: 20th Anniversary Limited Edition’
In 2018, La-La Land Records released Saving Private Ryan: 20th Anniversary Limited Edition, a commemorative – and slightly updated – reissue of John Williams’ 1998 soundtrack featuring most of his score for Steven Spielberg’s widely-acclaimed World War II drama set amidst the backdrop of the June 6, 1944 Normandy landings and the first week of…
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Music Album Review: ‘Saving Private Ryan: Music from the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack’
On July 21, 1998, Dreamworks Records – the now defunct label founded by Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and David Geffen in 1996 as a subsidiary to their film studio Dreamworks SKG – released Saving Private Ryan: Music from the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, a one-hour-long soundtrack album with music composed and conducted by John Williams.…
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On Music: My 10 Favorite Non-Star Wars Themes by John Williams
I have been a fan of composer/conductor John Williams since I first watched Star Wars in a crowded theater in October of 1977 at the Concord Mall in South Florida. I didn’t know it at the time – I was a 14-year-old at the time and rarely paid attention to the “Music by” credits in…
A Certain Point of View, Too 