Harry Potter producer David Heyman was in Los Angeles last night for an event held at an Apple store where he took some questions from fans. Reader Richard asked the producer about legendary John Williams and a possible return to score Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. David Heyman confirmed they have indeed talked to Mr. Williams about his return to writing the music for the series, noting " If we can make work , and that's a big if, for his schedule and ours then yes." You can hear the audio of the entire question and answer here via youtube and the transcript of this question is as follows:
RA (Richard Alexander)
DH (David Heyman)
RA: Hi, First I want to say thank you for your amazing work.
DH: Thank You.
RA: In a recent interview John Williams said that he would love to come
back and bring his musical storytelling "full circle". Will he come
back for Deathly Hallows?
DH: The question is will John Williams come back? I'm a huge fan of
John Williams he did three of the scores and I think he is amazing. He
came up with some of the themes that have carried on. We have talked to
John Williams and a lot of it will depend on his schedule for [Harry
Potter] seven part two. If we can make work , and that's a big if, for
his schedule and ours then yes.
RA: Great, thanks.
AWESOME! I love Nicholas Hooper’s scores for Order of the Phoenix and Half-Blood Prince, but having John Williams back for the end would just be perfect. I hope it works out!
I think John William would be absolutely perfect for the sweeping scale that will no-doubt accompany the eighth film. If you’ve heard some of his more recent scores (including Munich, War of the Worlds and Revenge of the Sith) you’ll know he can do dark, and do it well. I think Prisoner of Azkaban was some of his most outstanding work and I wish he could have stayed on to develop some of the smaller themes introduced in that film. I also like the idea of him musically bookmarking the series.
If they can work it out for him to return, I would be one happy camper.
I would greatly love to see John Williams return for the last films. That said I appreciate Hooper’s latest score, but not OotP (all ‘moments’ – no coherent thread) having heard it on Yahoo. His transition from Hedwig’s Theme in ‘Ginny’ is superb and he captures the Weasley’s so well.
But, yes, I love the strong emotional core that runs right through each of the Williams scores for Harry Potter and who can hear Hedwig’s Theme without suddenly going back to the moment you realised that Harry Potter was really going to be on fil.!
Amazing that I was thinking about this moments before clicking on the latest news here. It is constantly on my mind, and I hope hope HOPE that Williams gets to do this. If not just compose and conduct the first film as usual, write the second, and perhaps have William Ross adapt it again like he did for Chamber. It really is only fitting that he close the loop that he started by doing the last film(s). While Hooper’s music may have served the two latest films enough, it is clear that action is not his forte, and the score for the exciting story that is Deathly Hallows needs to be just as exciting. Or, I am telling you, it will NOT work.
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I actually prefer the Hooper’s scores to Williams’— I think they have a lot more personality and suit the darker tone of the films.