Biography

b. John Towner Williams, 8 February 1932, Flushing, Long Island, New York, USA. A composer, arranger, and conductor for film background music from the early 60s to the present. As a boy, Williams learned to play several instruments, and studied composition and arranging in Los Angeles after moving there with his family in 1948. Later, he studied piano at the Juilliard School Of Music, before composing his first score for the film I Passed For White in 1960. it was followed by others, such as Because They're Young, The Secret Ways, Bachelor Flat, Diamond Head, Gidget Goes To Rome, and None But The Brave, directed by, and starring Frank Sinatra. Williams scored Ronald Reagan's last film, The Killers, in 1964, and continued with Please Come Home, How To Steal A Million, The Rare Breed and A Guide For Married Men. In 1967 Williams gained the first of more than 25 Oscar nominations for his adaptation of the score to Valley Of The Dolls, and after writing original scores for other movies such as Sergeant Ryker, Daddy's Gone A-Hunting, and The Reivers, he won the Academy Award in 1971 for Best Adaptation for Fiddler On The Roof. In the early 70s, Williams seemed to be primarily concerned with "disaster" movies, such as The Poseidon Adventure, The Towering Inferno, Earthquake and Jaws, for which he won his second Oscar in 1975.
He then proceeded to score some of the most commercially successful films in the history of the cinema, including the epic Star Wars, Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, Superman, The Empire Strikes Back, Raiders Of The Lost Ark and E.T. The Extra Terrestrial - for several years the highest-grossing film of all time - and another Academy Award winner for Williams. On and on Williams marched with The Return Of The Jedi, Indiana Jones And The Temple Of Doom, Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade, The River, The Accidental Tourist, Born On The Fourth Of July and Presumed Innocent. As for recordings, he had US singles hits with orchestral versions of several of his films' themes and main titles, and a number of his soundtracks entered the album charts. Real pop prestige came to Williams in 1977, when record producer Meco Monardo conceived a disco treatment of his themes for Star Wars, which included music played in the film by the Cantina Band. "Star Wars/Cantina Band" by Meco, spent two weeks at number 1 in the USA. For his work in the early 90s, Williams received Oscar nominations for the highly successful Home Alone (the score, and "Somewhere In My Memory", lyric by Leslie Bricusse), the score for Oliver Stone's highly controversial JFK, and "When You're Alone' (again with Bricusse) for Steven Spielberg's Hook. After contributing the music to Far And Away and Home Alone 2: Lost In New York, Williams returned to Spielberg in 1993 to score the director's dinosaur drama, Jurassic Park, and another multi Oscar winner, Schindler's List. Williams himself won an Academy Award for his sensitive music for the latter picture. In 1999 he contributed the soundtrack to the most eagerly anticipated movie in cinematic history, George Lucas" Star Wars Episode 1 - The Phantom Menace. Two years later he was commissioned to write the soundtrack for Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone.
Williams' impressive list of soundtracks for blockbuster movies is unlikely to ever be beaten, but as well as his highly impressive feature film credits he has written for television productions such as Heidi, Jane Eyre and The Screaming Woman. In 1985, he was commissioned by NBC Television to construct themes for news stories, which resulted in pieces such as "The Sound Of The News", and featured a fanfare for the main bulletin, a scherzo for the breakfast show, and several others, including "The Pulse Of Events", and "Fugue For Changing Times". Williams added the Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone soundtrack to his portfolio in 2001.
COMPILATIONS: Greatest Hits 1969-1999 (Sony Classical 2003)***.

Encyclopedia of Popular Music
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