Music by John Williams

Music by John Williams

What made Music by John Williams truly special for me, were the heartfelt insights from world-class talents who worked with him, offering a unique and intimate glimpse into his musical brilliance. Among the luminaries featured in the film are cellist Yo Yo Ma, Coldplay’s Chris Martin, saxophone great Branford Marsalis, legendary violinists Anne-Sophie Mutter, Itzhak Perlman and directors George Lucas, Ron Howard, J.J. Abrams, James Mangold (A Complete Unknown) and of course Steven Spielberg. As Spielberg said, look at a scenes like the Flying Theme From E.T. or the last scenes from Saving Private Ryan or Schindler’s List without the music to truly understand Williams’ impact on the movie. Their homage to the man and the musician, often delivered with a surprising sense of humor, turns this into more of a celebratory ode to his artistry than a biopic. Many of Williams collaborators come forth with the hidden backstory to his most storied creations.

A prime example of this is the iconic score for Jaws, where Spielberg’s malfunctioning mechanical sharks nearly sank the over-budget production. When Steven Spielberg first approached John Williams about the music, he played a temp track using Williams’ own dark, abstract score from Robert Altman’s movie Images (one of Altman’s favorites),  during a scene where they are chasing after the shark. Thomas Newman (Shawshank Redemption), points out that the more composers are guided towards a  “temp track” the more “creative doors start to close.” Williams’ thankfully held true to his own vision of the movie as more of a swashbuckling adventure. Then pairing the orchestral score with a two note haunting “bah bump” motif, with the actors’ terrified reactions, made you feel the shark, even when you couldn’t see it, turning mechanical failure into pure terror. Truly a case of “absence makes the heart beat faster.”

Williams originally shied away from the idea of a feature-length documentary chronicling his career, but director Laurent Bouzereau, who had a 30-year relationship with Williams, reassured him — with a little help from longtime friend Steven Spielberg. “John is incredibly humble and private,” Bouzereau explains, “but I told him the film would focus on his music, highlighting his creative legacy, the orchestral community, and an art form that might one day fade.” Williams embraced the project, welcoming Bouzereau into his creative space — even sharing the piano where he composed the iconic Jaws and Close Encounters of the Third Kind themes. Bouzereau crafted the documentary using decades of interviews, archival footage, and carefully curated cues from Williams’ vast catalog. Laurent does not probe for answers or responses but rather opens up a discussion and lets Williams take the lead. “I never asked him about the passing of his wife. All I said was, ‘I love the first violin concerto. Tell me about it.’ ‘Well, I lost my wife, and that’s how I wrote it.’ And then he went into talking about it.”

Though not as spectacular as the industry interviews, for me the most captivating were the words and photos he shared about his childhood in a family steered by Johnny Sr. a celebrated drummer (Benny Goodman, Raymond Scott) surrounded by siblings who played and taught music. The pictures of a young Johnny Williams and the insights, especially those from his sister Joan, illuminate the personal and professional journey undertaken by this humble genius. His dad moved the family to Los Angeles and soon became a regular with the studio bands to whom he introduced his talented young son Johnny JR., who loved hanging out at the studios even before he began his professional career. 

Upon graduating from Julliard he would not only orchestrate scores for greats like Franz Waxman, Bernard Herrmann and Alfred Newman but became the featured pianists on scores like Peter Gunn, Some Like Hot, West Side Story and my favorite, To Kill A Mockingbird. This accents the truly remarkable fact he could have had a storied career as a pianist, arranger or composer. Instead of course, he chose all three. His instrumental and compositional prowess enabled him to create scores for musical greats ranging from Itzhak Perlman to Branford Marsalis, who attest to the profound influence he had on their careers.

The biggest surprises for me were non-musicians expressing how deeply Williams’ work moved them emotionally. In one scene, Kate Capshaw starts weeping while discussing Schindler’s List with Laurent. When I asked Laurent if he intended to evoke that reaction, he said, “No, those moments happened completely on their own. My interview with Kate was about another film, and as we started chatting about John, she brought up Schindler’s List and just began weeping. We were with him everywhere, so I was able to capture that moment.” Violinist Itzhak Perlman admits he hesitated at first when John Williams asked him to play on the Schindler’s List score. But once he did, his performance, coupled with the visual power of the final scene, could move any of us to tears. Even now, when he plays it on concert stages around the world, it still resonates—carrying the weight of sorrow, resilience, and remembrance, touching hearts every time.

Just as often John William’s work is a cue for celebration whether it accompanies the band Coldplay as they enter to take the stadium’s stage, the beginning of the Olympics in Los Angeles or the his famous lightsaber battle with Gustavo Dudamel at the Hollywood Bowl with thousands of fans, lightsabers in hand, waving him on. 

At the end John Williams sums it up beautifully, “I’ve been impossibly lucky in life”, when he talks about his marriage of 50 years to his wife Samantha, the honors he has received from presidents and the music branch of the Academy. Chris Martin (Coldplay), “The main reason to celebrate him is to say thank you for something that brings that amount of joy. It is rare and precious.” J.J.Abrams commented, “He has this unbelievable superpower to create melodies you hear for the first time and can’t forget.” Music of John Williams is a movie of a melodic life you see, hear and never forget.