DrRingDing

I'm sure I'm not the first person to realize this by any means, but I'm listening Antonin Dvorak's ninth symphony (aka "New World Symphony") and I keep getting flashes of films.

In particular, I'm thinking that almost everything John Williams has done has been a rip off or elaboration on something Dvorak originally wrote.

For example, listen to the 4th movement of the symphony: it starts off sounding like Jaws, moves into Lord of the Rings (okay, so that's Howard Shore and not Williams) before becoming the Star Wars theme.

Is it just me or is a lot of classical film scoring these days not a rip off of Dvorak? The previously mentioned two composers being some of the most blatant.

What other classical artists have had themes pretty much directly ripped off?
-ringding-

Shiv Shankly

Try Holst's Mars from The Planets, for more of that Williams-esque sound. The first time I heard it, I thought of Star Wars. Also, Orff's Carmina Burana has influenced plenty of composers. James Horner has been accused many times of lifting various works for his scores, I'm sure Film Score Monthly has comments on that somewhere on their site.

wendersfan

I can't cite specific examples, but a lot of older horror works had scores that to my ears always sounded like Bela Bartok imitations.

Johnny Zhivago

Agreed on all points in this thread... And it's nice to see a classical discussion in the music forum.

jdodd

Take a listen to this disc from start to finish (including the Varese piece) and count the John Williams sources! I bought this a long time ago and listened to it and my jaw dropped.

I'll check out that Dvorak symphony, that ought to be fun.

Mordred

Yeah New World Symphony is where Williams got a lot of his inspiration. A very cool piece (and even cooler since it's about America) and at least Williams was stealing from one of the best.

dhmac

How's that saying go, something like "if you're going to steal, steal from the best."