The Music of America – JOHN WILLIAMS: Air and Simple Gifts; American Journey, Suite from Memoirs of a Geisha; Song for World Peace; Summon the Heroes; Hymn to New England, The Five Sacred Trees; Sound the Bells!; Elegy for Cello & Orch.; The Mission Theme; March from 1941, The Olympic Spirit; 11 themes from Williams’ film scores – Recording Arts Orch. of LA/Boston Pops/ London Sym. Orch./Utah Sym. Orch./ Pittsburgh Sym. Orch./Skywalker Sym. Orch./John Williams, cond. – Sony Masterworks 3-CD set 88697 70636 2 ****:
John Williams has been responsible during his six-decade-long career for some of the very best-known scores for major films. He’s done the Star Wars series, Jaws, Superman, the Indiana Jones series, E.T., Jurassic Park, Schindler’s List and three Harry Potter films. He has won five Academy Awards (and nominated for 45), four Golden Globes, and 21 Grammys. He was principal conductor of the Boston Pops Orchestra from 1980 to 1993.
In addition to his film score work, Williams has composed a wide variety of standard orchestral works and concertos, as well as music for some of America’s most important cultural and commemorative events – including the opening selection in this collection, which was created especially for President Obama’s inauguration. He has worked with some of the leading solo artists in the world of music. His score for Memoirs of a Geisha featured Yo-Yo Ma on cello and Itzhak Perlman on violin. Ma is also heard as soloist on the set’s Elegy for Cello and Orchestra and Perlman as the violin soloist on the theme from Schindler’s List.
This is physically a compact little package, considering it presents three CDs, many photos, and a complete note booklet. All the selections have been previously released on the Sony label, dating back to 1990. It is a welcome thing that all the selections are also conducted by Williams, and performed by some of the world’s finest orchestras. His versatility at creating jazz or classical scores for films is well known, and he is also an accomplished pianist. There have been various Williams soundtrack collections before, but few conducted by the composer himself. Williams’ film music generally follows the late Romantic orchestral style of his Hollywood predecessors such as Bernard Hermann, Franz Waxman and Alfred Newman. Though sometimes guilty of a lack of originality – his Star Wars music borrows heavily from Gustav Holst – he has been in great demand by film directors ever since his first major film score in 1958. Steven Spielberg used Williams for his very first film and most of this films ever since.
Detailed notes on each of the selections are in the booklet, plus an essay on Williams. Sonics are excellent thruout the reissue, but some of these selections were originally recorded in multichannel – it’s unfortunate they cannot be heard that way now.
– John Sunier
