LONDON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

RichTea [CC-BY-SA-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

The London Symhony Orchestra is one of the main symphony orchestras in England and was founded in 1904.
Enormous movie scores were recorded with this orchestra like Harry Potter, Star Wars and Superman.

Source : wikipedia

THE LAND BEFORE TIME EXPANDED EDITION: OUR EXCLUSIVE REVIEW

With their expanded 74-minute edition of The Land Before Time (1988), the diligent folks at Intrada bring back into the spotlights one of the absolute masterpieces of James Horner’s long and distinguished career. The music sounds as punchy and clear as ever, showcasing the flawless playing by the London Symphony Orchestra. The sound quality of the new edition is really incredible: we really feel like we are sitting next to the orchestra, privy to the slightest sound and little gasps of breath coming from the musicians. It feels like discovering the music all over again.This was necessary for this sumptuous music that

LEGENDS OF THE FALL EXPANDED EDITION: OUR EXCLUSIVE REVIEW

On 19 April 1994, James Horner finished recording at Abbey Road Studios with the London Symphony Orchestra. He had just delivered one of the most lyrical and romantic pieces of music in his career: Legends Of The Fall. Exactly twenty-six years and two days later, at a time when the world is undergoing a profound crisis, Intrada, in collaboration with TriStar Pictures and Sony Music Entertainment has gifted us all a stellar two-disc deluxe edition, expanding the already generous original album to include the complete score and providing over 35 minutes of alternates, extended cues and film edits. Completists will

ONCE UPON A FOREST – AN ANALYSIS OF THE COMPLETE SCORE

Notes on the movie Once Upon A Forest opened to mixed reviews on June 18, 1993 and was not the financial success that the filmmakers had hoped for – of course, there was the small matter of Spielberg’s dinosaurs crowding the marketplace back then. None of this, however, kept Forest from being nominated for an Annie Award for Best Animated Feature in 1993 and winning an MPSE Golden Reel Award for Best Sound Editing. A quick internet search does not reveal very much about the production, but there is an informative Wikipedia page. It has this to say about the production. Once Upon

BALTO EXPANDED EDITION: OUR EXCLUSIVE REVIEW

James Horner once said he never turned down a project offered to him by Steven Spielberg. (Neither would any other composer in their sane mind, I imagine.) After Schindler’s List (1993), Spielberg embarked on a string of serious movies calling for increasingly subdued scores. Before 1993, however, the projects he directed and executive-produced represented one broad canvas after another on which the film composer was encouraged to paint with bold strokes and unashamedly operatic colors, every new assignment the promise of a rich symphonic tapestry. For Balto, Horner again delivered on that promise and then some. James Horner had already scored

THE WORDS OF JAMES HORNER #6: THE MASK OF ZORRO

Three years after James Horner’s passing, we thought we would bring together three interviews on The Mask of Zorro, whose soundtrack album was released twenty years ago, in October 1998. The rather short first interview was the introduction to a lengthy talk with the composer on Titanic. That discussion took place on 28 November 1997 during the recording sessions of the first Zorro score and the transcription was published as The Words of James Horner #4. The second interview dates back to the fall of 1998 and coincided with the album release. The third interview finds James Horner reminiscing about The Mask of

THE WORDS OF JAMES HORNER #4: BACK TO TITANIC

To celebrate the release of Titanic in 4 CD edition by La-La Land (see our exclusive review here) we present an interview with James Horner never before published in English. This short interview was originally published in 1998 in the French magazine Dreams To Dream. One more unpublished interview in English, dating from 2005 at the release of the Special Collector's Edition DVD of the film, will follow. Recall: The Words of James Horner is a series of articles intended to republish some twenty interviews Didier Leprêtre and Jean-Christophe Arlon conducted between 1997 and 2006 and published only in French in

TITANIC ALBUM TIMELINE

Originally released on November 18 1997, TITANIC: Music From The Motion Picture contained 15 tracks, most of which were arrangements of material from the film rather than material straight from the film and included the more restrained version of the song My Heart Will Go On performed by Celine Dion. This album soon became the biggest selling film score in history, with over 30 million copies sold. In negotiating his deal with Sony Music, James Horner was so confident in the film and the album he managed to earn approximately $1.20 for every copy sold, providing him with enough income

INTERVIEW WITH DOUGLAS TRUMBULL

As part of the publication of episode 7 of Fond Memories on Brainstorm, we publish this interview with director Douglas Trumbull which was conducted by Didier Leprêtre and originally published in Dreams Magazine in 1996. What do you remember about Brainstorm 15 years later ? I remember a long and difficult job. Brainstorm took up more than 5 years of my life. I started working on it in 1978 and it was only released in 1983. Tragedy struck when Natalie Wood died at the end of 1981 [29/11/81] under the circumstances that you know. I remember that we only had a few

FOND MEMORIES #7: 1983 - KRULL AND BRAINSTORM

Fond Memories is our step-by-step overview of James Horner’s career. We aim for it to be as comprehensive as possible. If you have additional information that is relevant to this episode, please do not hesitate to contact us. This seventh episode covers the year 1983 and especially Brainstorm and Krull, two early highlights of James Horner’s career. This episode covers the following scores: Krull (1983) Brainstorm (1983) The success of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (see episode 6) and 48 HRS, the two movies entrusted to the young James Horner by Joel Sill, vice-president of Paramount Pictures’ music department, were seminal influences in

STANDOUT SET PIECES #2: ELORA DANAN FROM WILLOW

“It is a time of dread... Seers have foretold the birth of a child who will bring about the downfall of the powerful queen Bavmorda. Seizing all pregnant women in the realm, the evil queen vows to destroy the child when it is born...” 1 Bringing you up to speed For his second collaboration with Ron Howard (after Cocoon), James Horner was tasked with composing the then-longest score of his career. The fantasy film, produced by George Lucas, is about a diminutive Elwyn who rises from his humble peasant origins to become the sorcerer-hero who defeats the evil queen Bavmorda and her

THE PAGEMASTER and BRAVEHEART – TWO EXPANDED AND REMASTERED RELEASES

2015 will soon come to an end, leaving the world without one of its greatest musical talents in James Horner halfway through on June 22, 2015. One month prior, La-La Land Records released an expanded and remastered album for the 1993 score to Searching For Bobby Fischer, and of course James Horner's output at the time was going strong with his double concerto Pas de Deux, and the Chinese/French co-produced epic, Wolf Totem. Looking back as we close out November, we gratefully received two posthumously released scores from the films, The 33 and Southpaw, soon after James Horner's passing. As the year

BAFTA GURU: A CONVERSATION WITH JAMES HORNER

29 April 2015. With host Tommy Pearson and a small audience, an important 75 minutes was to unfold. It is disheartening to note that this, a typical but always insightful interview with Tommy Pearson, would be the last interview our late maestro would give before his sudden passing on June 22, 2015. With this in mind, the angelic manners of James Horner's conveyance of thought are ever more heartbreaking as he describes some of his career highlights and passions to Tommy and the audience. His wonderfully unique way thinking and speaking those thoughts will be as sorely missed as the mystical

TITANIC CONCERT IN LONDON IN APRIL 2015

Remember: It should have been on May 19, 1999 in London. James Horner and Sony Music had organized the Titanic concert. In the program, there would have been two suites written for the album, Back To Titanic: "Titanic Suite", "Epilogue - The Deep and Timeless Sea", as well as a Celtic medley including Patriot Games / Braveheart / The Devil's Own and the world premiere of a ballet, Celtic, with the Riverdance troupe. Unfortunately consumed by the composition of the score for Mighty Joe Young, the composer had not time to finish his ballet and the concert had to be

AUSTRALIA, 1991: JAMES HORNER SEMINARS

Having published interviews given in the early 80's to the CinemaScore magazine (see our article), we continue our exploration of the archives of the past with the publication of the two seminars which James Horner participated in, December 1991 in Australia. That year, the Australian Film Television and Radio School (AFTRS) was celebrating film music with a series of courses and activities to recognize and celebrate the contribution that music makes to the screen experience. James Horner had made the trip to take part in a variety of national activities intended to stimulate an atmosphere of appreciation for the work of

JAMES HORNER FILM MUSIC