‘Star Wars’ Composer John Williams is Retiring From Scoring Films After ‘Indiana Jones 5’
John Williams, the man who gave Star Wars its iconic musical themes, has announced that he will be retiring from scoring films after completing his work on Indiana Jones 5 – but this will not be the end of his musical career.
While speaking to The Washington Post, John Williams explained that he will be putting down the baton when his work on Indiana Jones 5 has finished. (His only other unreleased film score, which is being made for Steven Spielberg’s semi-autobiographical film The Fabelmans, will arrive later this year.) Incidentally, he also implied that Harrison Ford will be retiring from film acting with the movie as well, although he has not made any such announcement:
“At the moment I’m working on Indiana Jones 5, which Harrison Ford – who’s quite a bit younger than I am – I think has announced will be his last film. So, I thought: If Harrison can do it, then perhaps I can, also.”
John Williams, who is now 90 years old, cited the long commitment a film score takes to make as a reason why he will not be committing to more after the long-awaited 2023 finale to the adventure franchise. Williams already confirmed the end of his involvement with Star Wars feature films after completing his work on every installment of the nine-film Skywalker Saga with Star Wars Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker, although he agreed to compose themes for Galaxy’s Edge, Solo, and the recently-completed Obi-Wan Kenobi series for Disney Plus. Williams is also not planning on doing anything beyond Indiana Jones 5, given that film is the end of its respective franchise. Star Wars franchise creator George Lucas referred to his work as “the special sauce” that helped make the long-running science fantasy franchise movie magic, and Harrison Ford emotionally cited his lifelong friendship with the composer as a highlight of his life at Star Wars Celebration Anaheim last month.
However, John Williams noted that he will not be retiring from music altogether, as he plans to continue writing and composing concert music outside of scoring for film and television. He explained that his commitment to the field of music has helped him gain a better appreciation of life:
“It’s given me the ability to breathe, the ability to live and understand that there’s more to corporal life. Without being religious, which I’m not especially, there is a spiritual life, an artistic life, a realm that’s above the mundanities of everyday realities. Music can raise one’s thinking to the level of poetry. We can reflect on how necessary music has been for humanity. I always like to speculate that music is older than language, that we were probably beating drums and blowing on reeds before we could speak. So it’s an essential part of our humanity. It’s given me life.”
Beyond the realm of the galaxy far, far away and the man who gave adventure his name, both of which feature a number of musical compositions that any accomplished musical composer would kill for, John Williams has an embarrassment of riches when it comes to his film scores. These include the likes of Fiddler on the Roof, The Poseidon Adventure, Earthquake, The Towering Inferno, Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Superman: The Movie, E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial, Empire of the Sun, Home Alone, Jurassic Park, Schindler’s List, Saving Private Ryan, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, War of the Worlds, Munich, War Horse, Lincoln, The Post, and many other films across over six decades of composing. Williams’s work in film and television has netted him deserved recognition with 5 Academy Awards, 4 Golden Globes, 3 Emmys, 7 British Academy Film Awards, and 8 Saturn Awards, and countless nominations. We, the longtime fans of his work at Star Wars News Net, salute him for his lifetime of achievement in this field – the Force is with him.
John Williams’s latest release, the main theme for the Disney Plus series Obi-Wan Kenobi, can be heard in the credits for every episode, and will be available for purchase next week.
Grant has been a fan of Star Wars for as long as he can remember, having seen every movie on the big screen. When he’s not hard at work with his college studies, he keeps himself busy by reporting on all kinds of Star Wars news for SWNN and general movie news on the sister site, Movie News Net. He served as a frequent commentator on SWNN’s The Resistance Broadcast.
