Saluting 'The Maestro': John Williams and the Academy Awards
Hello, Islanders!
John Williams has received a record (53) Academy Award nominations for his music (both score and original song). Yet he is third on the list of most music Oscars won. Alfred Newman won an amazing (9) Academy Awards - on (43) nominations. Newman’s sons David and Thomas also became composers and have a combined (16) nominations between them, though no wins. Alan Menken, who composed for most of the biggest Disney animated films of the past (35) years, has taken home (8) Oscars in (19) nominations. In third place is John Williams who, despite a record number of nominations – he is second only to Walt Disney, who received (59) nominations – has (5) golden statues on his piano. From 1972 through 2022, Williams was nominated for at least one Academy Award every year but sixteen.
I use the term “at least” because in many years he was actually competing against himself in the Best Original Score category. Whether it was his score for Star Wars up against Close Encounters of the Third Kind, A.I. versus Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. or Empire of the Sun competing against The Witches of Eastwick, Williams’ skills were often recognized plurally. Heck, the year he was up for both Empire and Witches, he may have had a third nomination in the category has he been able to do the score for The Color Purple. Here is a list of the awards he DID win:
Williams already had three nominations under his belt when he won his first Academy Award, for Best Music, Scoring Adaptation and Original Song Score in 1972 for his work on Fiddler on the Roof. Oscar number two came four years later when his now classic score for Steven Spielberg’s JAWSwas named the years Best Original Score. Williams was conducting the orchestra that night and had to hurry out of the pit to accept his award.
1978 saw him pitted against himself for the first time as his scores for Star Wars and CE3K were nominated. He won for Star Wars, but I think his work on CE3K was monumental. Music drives the last quarter of the film and it’s the music that makes the film so powerful.
Five years later he was back at the podium, taking home the award for E.T. the Extra Terrestrial. Eight nominations – and three Oscars – in eight years seemed to signal the beginning of an Oscar dynasty for the prolific composer. Eleven years later, in 1994, he won his fifth Academy Award for his brilliant and moving score to Schindler’s List. Unbelievably, this was the last Oscar he won (as I write this). If you’re reading this in the future, say June of 2058, he may have won a couple of more. Feel free to write in and complain that I was wrong. I may already be dead, so it won’t hurt my feelings!
Words by Michael A Smith. Michael is co-author of Jaws 2: The Making Of The Hollywood Sequel. You can order the book by contacting Michael at OsFanMike@aol.com.
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