CoS Soundtrack Comments

[GulPlum]

"Nia" wrote:

> I read somewhere, I cannot recall exactly, that there was another 
> composer involved who worked with John Williams' material for CoS 
> and finished it off with some of his own, attempting to merge their 
> two styles into something cohesive.  Has anyone else heard that?  
> This music does have a very Williamsesque sound to it, though, 
> doesn't it?

Yes, it does. I find it extremely monotonous and "smaey" (the 
hallmark of all Williams' music in my book). :-) 

Yes, there is very much another composer involved. The music is 
actually written by William Ross, based on "themes" written by John 
Williams (the stuff for PS/SS, plus four new themes). It's therefore 
unfair on Ross to say that this is Williams' music - after all, the 
vast majority of classical music is built on developing themes from 
folk music, yet it is usually the "composer" who is glorified as the 
author rather than the music's folkloric roots (although there are, 
of course, exceptions, when composers admit their sources). The fact 
that the author of the themes in this case is identifiable makes no 
difference.

Incidentally, this is not the first time this approach to film music 
composition has been used. Off the top of my head, Williams is the 
(quoted, credited) source for at least a couple of sequels scored by 
Ken Hall, and Jerry Goldsmith's score for "Supergirl" is based 
entirely on Williams' themes from "Superman".