Giacchino: John Williams should score Episode VII

Scoring (a) Star Wars

There’s been a lot of speculation that Michael Giacchino, who’s scored all of J.J. Abrams’ films, might step in to replace or collaborate with John Williams on Episode VII. But Williams said earlier this year that he’d like to return, and now Yahoo reports that Giacchino is all for it.

“One of the things that excites me most about ‘Star Wars’ coming back is chance to hear a John Williams score,” he said at a weekend Q&A in Switzerland:

“He has been a great inspiration to me over the years,” he continued. “He has been a great teacher to me and good friend and I would love nothing more than to hear more of his music from that universe.”

“If it were up to me I would say ‘John, you must do it.'”

In addition to Abrams’ films (and Star Tours: The Adventures Continue,) Giacchino has scored several films for Disney and Pixar. He was nominated for an Oscar for Ratatouille in 2008 and won in 2010 for Up. Williams, of course, has 5 Oscars, including one for the original Star War score.

8 Replies to “Giacchino: John Williams should score Episode VII”

  1. Episode VII could probably still be done by John Williams but he’s not getting younger, and sooner or later they will have to make a switch. If they’re smart, they’ll try to team Williams and Giacchino and eventually let Giacchino take over for good. The old Harry Potter switcheroo… :-)

  2. Perhaps, but people are far too eager to slot in Giacchino (or some other composer they like) and it feels a bit… vulgar.

    There’s no way Williams isn’t the first choice, so if he’s not feeling up to it when the time comes, then let him make the decision.

  3. I am glad to read this. Of course, there is no doubt that John Williams is by far the best possible choice. Having said that, if JW were to decide he doesn’t want to do more SW, I would be enthusiastically supportive of Giacchino taking over the baton.

  4. Harry Potter showed that they can survive a musical transition from John Williams, but if he wants to do it, I hope they still bring him in.

    Star Wars is his baby.

  5. I think it is safe to say it will be Williams scoring and conducting the next trilogy’s music.

    It is pretty safe to say if Williams should have any problems over the next six years, Michael Giacchino will probably be the person to continue his work.

    John Williams is 81 now, he will be 83 before he even gets to start working on the film. So he might be around 87 before he is finished.

    I think he can do it. I hope he does it. At the same time, not many of us get to live to be 87, let alone an 87 where you’re still productive and working.

    I don’t see people as being too eager to slot in Michael Giacchino. It just makes sense because he’s Abram’s composer. So far we have only seen Bad Robot alumni hired in key positions for Episode VII. Unless there is a scheduling conflict, Michael Giacchino would be the replacement based off historical trends between Abrams and Giachhino, Giachino’s work on Star Tours, and his relationship with Williams.

    I would bet on Episode VII at the very least giving us one more John Williams score.

  6. He’d getting older, but he should be the one who makes the outlines of the ST music – even if he wouldn’t be able to go through all three films!

  7. I think that’s the great thing about Williams doing VII is that we get new themes for characters that can be extrapolated upon, hopefully by Williams.

    I have to say, I liked how the music of I-III’s leitmotifs were interwoven into character themes that hinted at their IV-VI themes. I hope Williams continues that trend and transforms the IV-VI’s themes into the next iteration, so the totality of the saga’s score is progressive and evolving along a linear line. Though it is hard to imagine getting more bombastic than he did with IV-VI.

  8. I cannot imagine Star Wars without John Williams.

    OTOH I would have said I couldn’t imagine Trek without ITS iconic music, either. The bar fight followup (with Bruce Greenwood as Captain Pike) started me thinking I could learn to like this Trek, but it’s the musical cue “Enterprising Young Men” where we see the Enterprise for the first time where they GOT me. If someone at some point has to take over from Williams and extrapolate on his themes, I would trust Giacchino to do it. He was very respectful of Alexander Courage’s television theme for Trek to point of leaving me liking it more than I had previously. I doubt he can manage that with Star Wars, but if someone HAS to try, I’d feel more confident about him being the one.

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