Classic Ross Amico

Tag: John Williams

John Williams Birthday Salute on Sweetness and Light

I just finished producing a salute to John Williams, to be broadcast on the occasion of his 93rd birthday on “Sweetness and Light.” It turned out to be quite the miscellany – 15 selections – and I assure you, they’re not all the usual suspects, as you will divine from the CD on the top of the pile!

If you’re a Williams fan – and who isn’t it? – I hope you’ll join me this Saturday morning at 11:00 EST/8:00 PST. I’ll be lighting an awful lot of candles on KWAX, the radio station of the University of Oregon!

Stream it, wherever you are, at the link:

https://kwax.uoregon.edu/

February 6, 2025
Dystopian Movie Soundtracks on the Radio

If you think the world is in rough shape now, fasten your seatbelt; it’s going to be a bumpy 1,461 days.

This week on “Picture Perfect,” gaze into the crystal ball for an hour of dystopian visions – glimpses of a bleak future rendered hopeful, in large part, through music.

“Fahrenheit 451” (1966), based on the Ray Bradbury novel, presents a society in which books are outlawed by the state and burned as a means to control the masses. The title refers to the temperature at which paper will ignite. Oskar Werner and Julie Christie star in this Francois Truffaut-directed film. Composer Bernard Herrmann finds the heart at fire’s center.

A robot is left behind to clean up a long-abandoned Planet Earth, in “WALL-E” (2008), one of Pixar’s finely-crafted entertainments. This one has a serious subtext, about rampant consumerism and its impact on an earth made uninhabitable by the sheer volume of garbage.

But there’s also a love story, as WALL-E pursues another robot into outer space, with fate-changing consequences. The inventive score is by Thomas Newman.

As dystopias go, Steven Spielberg’s “A.I.: Artificial Intelligence” (2001) is a little more unpleasant than most. “A.I.” grew out of an incomplete project of Stanley Kubrick. Based on Brian Aldiss’s short story, “Super-Toys Last All Summer Long,” the film stars Haley Joel Osment as a child-like android programmed to love, only to be rejected by his adopted family. Abrasive blood sport, unpleasant visions of a debauched city, and human extinction ensue. A great time is had by all!

Also, the film doesn’t know when to end. Oh, how I hate this movie.

That said, John Williams gives it his usual best. The voice of soprano Barbara Bonney graces the admittedly gorgeous soundtrack.

One of the landmarks of silent cinema, Fritz Lang’s “Metropolis” (1927) is an eerily prescient vision of a world divided between the “haves” and “have-nots.” Once seen, the subterranean hell of the workers “hive” is not soon to be forgotten. So much of the film continues to resonate, even as its iconography is shamelessly recycled.

Gottfried Huppertz’s original score already adheres to the Straussian model of Golden Age film scores, with leitmotifs representing the characters and ideas. It’s a concept that became associated with Max Steiner and Erich Wolfgang Korngold, and which has had an enormous influence on film composers down through the decades, all the way to John Williams and beyond.

Learn more about the challenges of writing such a complex score – which was performed live, with orchestra, at showings of the movie, even as the film was still being edited right up until its premiere – when listening to tonight’s show.

In the meantime, hang on to your humanity! Join me for these cautionary tales about totalitarian government, corporate control, and technology gone awry, on “Picture Perfect,” music for the movies, now in syndication on KWAX, the radio station of the University of Oregon!

Clip and save the start times for all three of my recorded shows:

PICTURE PERFECT, the movie music show – Friday at 8:00 PM EST/5:00 PM PST

SWEETNESS AND LIGHT, the light music program – ALL NEW! – Saturday at 11:00 AM EST/8:00 AM PST

THE LOST CHORD, unusual and neglected rep – Saturday at 7:00 PM EST/4:00 PM PST

Stream them, wherever you are, at the link!

https://kwax.uoregon.edu/

January 17, 2025
De Palma’s Picture Perfect Soundtracks

Brian De Palma is an extraordinarily adept filmmaker, who has been criticized for his adherence to “genre trash.” He has always been attracted to suspense and crime thrillers, usually of an especially violent nature, many of them tinged with horror.

This week on “Picture Perfect,” with Hallowe’en right around the corner, we’ll hear music from four of De Palma’s films.

It’s hardly surprising that such an admirer of Alfred Hitchcock would also hire Hitch’s signature composer. Bernard Herrmann scored two films for De Palma – “Sisters,” in 1973, and “Obsession,” in 1976.

“Obsession” is a spin on Hitchcock’s “Vertigo.” A botched rescue attempt results in the death of a businessman’s kidnapped wife. Years later, he encounters someone who could be her doppelganger. The film stars Genevieve Bujold, John Lithgow, and a very tan Cliff Robertson.

“The Fury,” from 1978, is a supernatural thriller based on a novel by John Farris. Two teenagers, endowed with powers of telekinesis and extra-sensory perception, are targeted by researchers who plan to harness them for their own nefarious ends. For a time, Kirk Douglas has fun as a former CIA agent, and John Cassavetes is a particularly slimy villain. Cassavetes’ comeuppance makes for one of the most memorable movie endings of its era – and we’ll leave it at that!

Critic Pauline Kael praised the music, which is by none other than John Williams – hot off his third Academy Award, for “Star Wars” – characterizing it as “as elegant and delicately varied a score as any horror film has ever had.”

Of course, “The Fury” was not the first De Palma film to deal with telekinesis. His adaptation of Stephen King’s “Carrie,” from 1976, became one the decade’s landmark horror films. It broadened King’s popularity and propelled De Palma into the A-list of Hollywood directors. It also essentially launched the careers of Amy Irving, John Travolta, and Nancy Allen, among others. Sissy Spacek was nominated for an Academy Award for her performance in the title role, as was Piper Laurie as Carrie’s overbearing, fundamentalist mother.

The music was by Pino Donaggio. The director had wanted to continue his collaboration with Herrmann, but the composer died before the film could be completed. Donaggio, though classically trained, made his fortune writing popular songs. His biggest hit was “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me,” which was recorded by Dusty Springfield and treated to a well-known cover by Elvis Presley. Donnagio went on to become a regular De Palma collaborator, providing the music for seven of his films.

Finally, we’ll turn our back on horror, to listen to music from a successful period crime thriller, loosely based on the real-life exploits of Eliot Ness and his fellow prohibition agents – “The Untouchables,” from 1987. Kevin Costner plays the by-the-book federal agent who is given a valuable lesson in street smarts by an Irish beat cop played by an Academy Award winning Sean Connery. (“He pulls a knife, you pull a gun. He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue. That’s the Chicago way, and that’s how you get Capone.”) Capone is played, incidentally, by a baseball bat wielding Robert De Niro.

The score is by Ennio Morricone. Morricone, of course, was propelled to fame through his work on Sergio Leone’s spaghetti westerns. He applies some of that same mythmaking skill to this big screen adaptation, which had previously been published as a memoir and developed into a popular television series starring Robert Stack. The high point of the film must be the director’s nail-biting homage to Sergei Eisenstein, a slow motion shoot-out around a baby carriage as it teeters down the stairs of Chicago Union Station.

Start your weekend with a step in the right direction, with music from the films of Brian De Palma, on “Picture Perfect,” music for the movies, now in syndication on KWAX, the radio station of the University of Oregon!

Clip and save the start times for all three of my recorded shows:

PICTURE PERFECT, the movie music show – Friday at 8:00 PM EDT/5:00 PM PDT

SWEETNESS AND LIGHT, the light music program – ALL NEW! – Saturday at 11:00 AM EDT/8:00 AM PDT

THE LOST CHORD, unusual and neglected rep – Saturday at 7:00 PM EDT/4:00 PM PDT

Stream them, wherever you are, at the link!

https://kwax.uoregon.edu/

October 4, 2024
John Williams’ Western Film Scores

Looking back on the cinematic western, by the mid-1970s it was definitely time to water the horses. For much of the preceding decade, most of the important statements in the genre had gone elegiac, revisionist, spaghetti, or some combination of the three.

With the release of “Star Wars” in 1977, elements of the western survived, but beyond a handful of exceptions, the western, like the swashbuckler, had moved to outer space.

Though John Williams became inextricably linked with the intergalactic spectacle, it is little known that he, in common with most of his contemporaries, scored a number of actual, old school westerns. This week on “Picture Perfect,” we’ll listen to music from four of them.

Westerns don’t get much more primal than when revenge becomes a motivator. Mark Rydell’s “The Cowboys” (1972), one of the better of John Wayne’s later films, draws blood when Bruce Dern commits an unspeakable crime against the American West. If you’re a collector of Boston Pops records, you may be familiar with the rousing overture Williams assembled from his score.

Before he slipped into a lazy pattern of inviting his celebrity friends to goof off in front of the camera and then cashing the paycheck, Burt Reynolds made a number of effective dramatic films. In “The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing” (1973), Reynolds plays a laconic train robber haunted by a secret in his past, who finds a second chance with Sarah Miles, the wife of one of his pursuers, who rides along with his gang. Williams provided a really groovy opening number for this one.

Despite the how-could-it-possibly-miss teaming of Marlon Brando and Jack Nicholson – with “Bonnie and Clyde” director Arthur Penn at the helm – “The Missouri Breaks” (1976) bombed with both critics and audiences. (If you ever wanted to see Brando in drag, then this is the film for you.) Williams took a different approach with this one, providing a more intimate, if off-kilter score, tinged with jazz and pop elements, and featuring guitar, banjo, harmonica, honky tonk piano, electric harpsichord, etc.

“The Rare Breed” (1966), on the other hand, is straight-down-the-middle, with James Stewart and Maureen O’Hara introducing Hereford cattle to the American west. Brian Keith, as Stewart’s rival, sports a red beard and a Scottish burr, for some reason. Williams, however, is wholly himself, providing an uplifting, wide-open main theme. Would that film composers still wrote like this.

Saddle up for selections from John Williams westerns this week, on “Picture Perfect,” music for the movies, now in syndication on KWAX, the radio station of the University of Oregon!

Clip and save the start times for all three of my recorded shows:

PICTURE PERFECT, the movie music show – Friday at 8:00 PM EDT/5:00 PM PDT

SWEETNESS AND LIGHT, the light music program – ALL NEW! – Saturday at 11:00 AM EDT/8:00 AM PDT

THE LOST CHORD, unusual and neglected rep – Saturday at 7:00 PM EDT/4:00 PM PDT

Stream them, wherever you are, at the link!

https://kwax.uoregon.edu/

PHOTOS: (clockwise from left) Reynolds loves Cat Dancing; Brando in touch with his feminine side; the Duke; and an unrecognizable Brian Keith

September 20, 2024
Close Encounters Returns Spielberg’s Sci-Fi Classic

“Close Encounters of the Third Kind” will return to theaters for showings on July 7 & 10, as part of a broader, ongoing celebration of Columbia Pictures for the studio’s 100th anniversary. (It’s a Fathom Event; google the complete schedule.)

Watching “Close Encounters” for the first time as an 11 year-old was a watershed moment in my movie-going experience. If you’ve only ever seen it at home, you haven’t really seen it. This is a film that definitely deserves to be experienced in a theater. Say what you will about Richard Dreyfuss’ sideburns, for me this will always be one of Steven Spielberg’s best films, with a transcendent score by John Williams. I would go so far as to say, “Close Encounters” is the most musical non-“musical” blockbuster ever made. I write much more about it here:

https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1608836975950253&set=a.279006378933326

Do yourself a favor, and check your local listings.

Alas, the “friendly extraterrestrial” movie seems to have been out of fashion now for quite some time. We seem to be mired in some neo-‘50s zeitgeist, as far as paranoia and invasion are concerned. But that certainly wasn’t the case back in 1982, when Steven Spielberg’s “E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial” almost singlehandedly turned everything on its head.

No more invaders from Mars. Spielberg would get to that a couple of decades later, when he remade H.G. Wells’ “The War of the Worlds.” No, during the Reagan Era, with the Cold War winding down and terrorism not yet so much in the news, cinematic E.T.’s were benevolent at best, or at worst, just trying to do their thing. They were there to be misunderstood and even imperiled by man until a warm, fuzzy, often poignant finale.

Spielberg had already explored the concept of the benevolent visitor from space, of course, with 1977’s “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.” But there was an ambiguity for much of the film as to what exactly the aliens’ intentions were. In fact, there is at least one sequence that would have given a child nightmares. Whatever tension is generated dissolves in the euphoric finale, centered on the communicative power of music. Like so many films back then and so few now, “Close Encounters” doesn’t so much exhaust the viewer as leave him or her with feelings of uplift and hope.

John Williams wrote the music for both “Close Encounters” and “E.T.,” and the two scores couldn’t be more different. For “CE3K,” the avant-garde syntax of the early, eerier sequences dissolves into unabashed romanticism for the transcendent finale. “E.T” takes a much more intimate approach. The moving story of a friendship between a boy and a stranded botanist for another world is rendered in music that is by turns tender, buoyant, and touching. The score earned Williams a much-deserved fourth Academy Award. “E.T.” may very well be Williams’ masterpiece, and Spielberg’s too.

The “friendly” alien of “The Day the Earth Stood Still” (1951), Klaatu, may come in peace, but it is a message delivered with tough love. If mankind refuses to abide, his giant robot, Gort, will destroy the planet. At a time when Martians invariably meant trouble, this was actually progressive. Bernard Herrmann’s score is one of his best, and certainly one of his most interesting. Always an eccentric orchestrator, Herrmann’s concept of extra-terrestrial music incorporates violin, cello, electric bass, two theremins, two Hammond organs, a large studio electric organ, three vibraphones, two glockenspiels, two pianos, two harps, three trumpets, three trombones and four tubas. Overdubbing and tape-reversal techniques were also employed.

Finally, Ron Howard’s “Cocoon” (1985) is one of the more worthwhile of the seemingly endless procession of extraterrestrial films to be released in the wake of “E.T.” At least this one took a different approach by bringing alien forces into contact with a Florida retirement community, with the unexpected result of rejuvenating its inhabitants. A modern take on the fabled Fountain of Youth, the film is a showcase for veteran actors Hume Cronyn, Jessica Tandy, Jack Gilford, and Don Ameche (who won an Academy Award). James Horner’s score is much sought after by collectors.

Klaatu barada nikto! I hope you’ll join me for the touchdown of benevolent extraterrestrial films on “Picture Perfect,” music for the movies, now in syndication on KWAX, the radio station of the University of Oregon!

Clip and save the start times for all three of my recorded shows:

PICTURE PERFECT, the movie music show – Friday at 8:00 PM EDT/5:00 PM PDT

SWEETNESS AND LIGHT, the light music program – ALL NEW! – Saturday at 11:00 AM EDT/8:00 AM PDT

THE LOST CHORD, unusual and neglected rep – Saturday at 7:00 PM EDT/4:00 PM PDT

Stream them, wherever you are, at the link!

https://kwax.uoregon.edu/

July 5, 2024

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