What is your opinion of John Williams (the film composer)?

Question

I realize his music isn't literally classical music, but this seems the most appropriate forum....

Answer 1

John Williams is a highly skilled plagiarist. You can see in his scores gestures and textures from Mahler, Stravinsky, Tchaikovsky, Orff, Verdi, etc.etc.

He is a very good orchestrator, but so much of his thematic material is borrowed.

Check out his score for "The Right Stuff" -- sounds suspiciously like Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto -- doesn't it?
There's a section in the first Star Wars movie where the two robots are wandering about in the desert of Tatooine -- the music is lifted directly from Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring".
In general, the texture of the music from the whole Star wars series sound like a Mahler symphony.

That's what I think.

Answer 2

I think he is a very talented gent. I must say, however, many pieces of his that I have heard bear remarkable similarities to number of classical pieces. Let us just say that he is well versed in the arts of his composer predecessors and leave it at that. Clearly he has a facility for matching up film footage with the appropriate musical themes. In Star Wars, for example, the "Duel of the Fates" is a great choral piece perfectly "in tune" with the epic lightsaber battle going on.
He is a wonderful orchestrator and arranger. As a film music guy he is without peer, but he has really yet to write a conventional "classical" piece that is in any way outstanding. Having said that, I'm not sure thats really his thing - he seems to like to do the work that solicits the highest fees. (And who can blame him for that.)

Answer 3

Aw, c'mon Glinzek tell us what you really think, quit holding back!
While some of his film scores do sound like parts from other pieces, the Star Wars "sound alikes" may have a partial explanation. I seem to remember reading somewhere that one of the requirements put forth by George Lucas was that the score had to sound like the "classical music" that was used in the old science fiction movies and serials from the '30's, 40's and 50's.

I can't speak to the sound alike status of his other films. I do know that he has written some serious concert music. He has done a series of concertos for different instruments including one for clarinet which is nice. I think one of the most clever themes he wrote was the 'bit' he did for NBC news which used the 8 notes of the major scale without going back and repeating one once leaving it.

While it may be irritating, the "classics" have been stolen from forever. A pop singer named Eric Carmen had a huge hit that was a note for note ripoff of a Rachmaninov symphony theme(gave no credit BTW on the piano sheet music). And wasn't the song "Full Moon and Empty Arms" taken from Rimsky-Korsakov or Rachmaninov?

I do like his film scores, ripoffs and all !!

Musician, composer, teacher.

Answer 4

I have to agree that accusing Williams of plagiarism is unwarranted and inappropriate. To recognize that his music has been influenced by his predecessors in the profession is no worse than noting that there are similarities between the music of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven. I don't see anybody accusing THEM of "plagiarism"!

For those who are open-minded enough to listen to Williams' music thoughtfully and objectively, it is quickly possible to notice that he does have a very distinctive sound to the point that I have seen movies and realized that he wrote the music without seeing his name in the credits until afterward.

Although he is best known for Star Wars, Harry Potter, and his collaboration with Steven Spielberg over the years, his music is capable of achieving a remarkable emotional depth, such as in "Schindler's List", "The Patriot", and "Far and Away".

Whether or not his music has any impact on posterity only time will be able to tell. I would seriously question the wisdom of anybody who attempts to make a prediction one way or the other, because history is full of composers who have fallen off the pages of history after being immensely popular during their own lifetime, as well as other composers who died in obscurity only to be "discovered" by millions of adoring listeners after their death.

Everybody please just keep your mouth SHUT and let time tell.

Answer 5

To criticise John Williams for plagiarism is to ignore the fact that almost every other film composer (of orchestral music) does the same thing. The most obvious example is the similarity between Gerry Goldsmith's score for "Omen" and Orff's "Carmina Burana", but there are numerous other examples, such as the hints of Wagner's "Parsifal" in Hermann's "Vertigo", or the sound of Shostakovich in John Barry's music.

Classical composers also copy each other. Talking of Shostakovich, the beginning of his 10th Symphony sounds very much like the beginning of Stravinsky's "The Rite of Spring". The beginning of the 4th movement of Mahler's 9th sounds like the beginning of the 3rd movement of Bruckner's 9th. Strauss, Shostakovich, Bruckner and Dvorak all used themes from Wagner in their work. So please, can we ditch the unhelpful plagiarism complaint and concentrate on the positive?

I would cite Williams's score for "Superman" as one of the most impressive and original orchestral soundtracks ever written. The main march and love theme are excellent, but the 'Fortress of Solitude' track is the finest piece of music by any film composer I've ever heard. You need to have the single disc version of the soundtrack to hear it at its best, though.

Answer 6

John Williams is tops. Period.
Everything he's ever written, I love.
I like classical music, too, and listen to lots of it, but I really think John Williams is something special. Classical, but not.
Perfect music. Perfect guy.

Answer 7

Great at composing for movies but I would like to hear him write an orchestral piece of music for its own sake

Answer 8

I think he's a first rate musician. Others have commented that he is a plagiarist. So what? His skill in music is good but his skill in knowing what piece of some one elses music would work to support a particular film scene, is truly remarkable.

Answer 9

Great music

Answer 10

He makes plagarism a profession.
Seriously! He steals so many themes and stuff from other music! It's insane...