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by John Williams
Orquesta Sinfónica de Puerto Rico / Puerto Rico Symphony...
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by John Williams
Orquesta Sinfónica de Puerto Rico / Puerto Rico Symphony Orchestra. Concierto en W.I.P.R. Canal 6/ Concert at W.I.P.R. Channel 6. Roselín Pabón, Director/ Conductor
Few fictional characters have been as prolific in mainstream entertainment as the Man of Steel. From the original comic stories in the 1930's to the Clayton Collyer radio show and Paramount's animated shorts in the 40's, the Kirk Alyn television shows of the 50's, the musical adaptation for theatre and George Reeves series of the 60's, the feature films of the 70's and 80's, the television spin-offs of the 90's and 00's, and finally, a resurrection to the big screen in 2006, the legend of Superman has thrived for more than 60 years. Upon the first major motion picture production in the mid-70's, director Richard Donner and his producers determined that the character would be treated with respect while, after all his adventures, providing him with a massive scale on which to generate his wonder. Their success in that production yielded four Oscar nominations (with one win) and a permanent "most favored Superman" status for actor Christopher Reeve. While the sequels for the 1978 film maintained much of the same cast, the legend was watered down to campy levels. One member of the crew who refused to kneel before General Zod was John Williams, whose score for the original Superman was such a natural fit with both the legend of the character and audiences' expectations that he had nothing left to prove by scoring the laughable sequels. In retrospect, Williams' music for Superman was so perfectly placed in both the film and in the history of cinema that this score, perhaps more than Star Wars, confirmed the renaissance of the operatic orchestral fanfare to the big screen. It proved that his Oscar-nominated work for Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Star Wars the previous year was no fluke, leading the composer on the journey of five subsequent years that would change film music forever. His Wagnerian extravaganza was so beloved by both fans of the legend and the mainstream that his sound for the character would endure in three immediate sequels and become the benchmark for future adaptations. Jerry Goldsmith would give the title theme a cameo in his mid-80's score for Supergirl and John Ottman would eventually utilize all of Williams' major themes for the successful Superman Returns nearly 30 years later.
The key to the longevity of Williams' music for the Superman legend is its timelessness. The instant recognizability of Williams' multitude of shamelessly obvious themes is also a contributing factor. Whether it's the unequivocal heroism, the patriotic feeling of soaring optimism that it instills in listeners, or even the brassy, overwhelming orchestral power that hooked so many people into the genre of film music at the time, Superman is a score of such quality that it cannot be completely eclipsed by the Star Wars and Indiana Jones franchise works also by Williams. When remembering the impact of Superman on listeners at the time, most people point to the themes rather than the style. And while the grandeur of the London Symphony Orchestra's performance of Williams' densely orchestrated and intelligently designed ideas are as alluring as ever, the themes do indeed define the score. The opening march provides the title character with a noble persona of galactic proportions, its simplistic octave-loving major key progressions serving the dose of superhero elixir that has, to some degree, worn badly with audiences through the years due to the brightness of its own light. So blatantly heroic is its construct that the title march is more difficult to enjoy thirty years later than the other themes from the film. By far superior in its agelessness is the love theme, highlighting the magnificent "Flying Sequence" in the film. Its lyrical sense of movement coincides with the fact that theme was originally designed with lyrics in mind ("Can You Read My Mind") and several pop variants were recorded for the scene before the now-famous classical performance and concert arrangement was used instead. Given the beauty of the theme and the remarkable personal tragedies that tormented lead actors Christopher Reeve and Margot Kidder in the following decades, the Superman love theme's only detraction is its bittersweet legacy. Still, in both its interlude performance in the primary march for the film, as well as its own generous song variants and concert arrangements, it is the best that Superman offers.
Text written by Michael Mattesino.
http://www.myspac...
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