The end of this month sees the release of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, the fifth and final installment of the film series that began in 1981 with Harrison Ford in the iconic role. Early reviews have piled in, and I myself may have figured out a key plot point in the film which I will not spoil, but whatever your thoughts are on the new film, I’m sure it’ll be a grand ride indeed.

But one thing about the film that I’m already looking forward to is the music. Once again it will have the grand maestro himself, John Williams, conducting the score, and to hear his iconic Raiders theme one more time will be sweet indeed.

My introduction to the world of film music and to John Williams’ music specifically came when I was ten years old and living in Mississippi, when my parents got me this legendary album…

Of course, like my classmates I indulged in a bit of rock and roll music, but it was film music that opened my mind to storytelling through music, something that continues to this day. This would follow with his soundtrack to Close Encounters of the Third Kind that year as well.

And then there was Superman.

If you were blessed like me to get this double LP, it had the same magnitude on me as did the Star Wars LP, even with much of the music unreleased at that point. It was a weird thing at the time, going to the movie theater and hearing certain parts of the music that weren’t there on the album, and then hearing certain parts of the album that weren’t in the movie. My 12-year-old brain couldn’t figure it out. It would also be the same with The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi as well. But I can’t tell you how many times I played the Star Wars and Superman LPs so much that even the scratches on the vinyl became noticeable with each successive listen.

I have to pause here because before the LP, there was the 45 RPM single.

This one I played the heck out of to the point where I could hear all of the scratches on the vinyl as well. But what was interesting was that the A side, the main theme, was abbreviated. It was edited by about a minute or so from what we heard in the concert arrangement on the LP. The B side, the love theme, was unedited from its album release. This 45 RPM was obviously intended to go out to radio stations to help promote the film’s release, so having this in your soundtrack collection is a find indeed. So this is what you would have heard had you had the 45 RPM back then…

Then came cassette tapes in the 1980s. Raiders of the Lost Ark. E.T. Return of the Jedi. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. And who knows how many more. And upgrading Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, and Superman to cassette tapes as well. But I didn’t just limit myself to John Williams. There were other wonderful maestros—Jerry Goldsmith, with his score to Star Trek: The Motion Picture, as well as Star Trek V at the end of the decade. John Barry and his beautiful score to Somewhere in Time. A young up and comer named James Horner with his scores to the second and third Star Trek films. And I would also discover older composers like Ken Thorne with his scores to Superman II and III, and Alexander Courage with his work on Superman IV and the original Star Trek TV series. The list just kept growing and growing, as did my collection.

In the 1990s I would expand my taste to include lush beautiful scores like John Barry’s epic score to Dances with Wolves, and the heartbreaking simplicity of John Williams’ haunting score for Schindler’s List. And the majesty of Hans Zimmer’s score to The Lion King. But eventually it would come back to Superman. In 1998 we got our first taste of an expanded score thanks to John Debney and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, which included about 20 minutes of previously unreleased music and reorchestrated versions of our favorite tracks from the film. It wasn’t everything, but it was better than nothing.

That CD was a precursor to what would follow in the year 2000, when Rhino Records released the first expanded version of the complete Superman score on CD. Mike Matessino had become known in the film and music communities for his work on the Alien and Aliens laserdiscs, and in 1997 he graced the world with fully expanded versions of the Star Wars trilogy scores on CD. Now he was hard at work on Superman, and he assembled the score using everything that was available at the time—the original LP, mixdown tapes, and trims—to assemble the score together. There were varying degrees of quality in some of the tracks, but at least the score was now complete. It proved to be one of Rhino’s bestselling CDs for a catalog title.

But at the time of the CD’s release, something happened that would change the game again. With the advent of DVD in 1997, the technology was expanding, and the discovery of a six-track mix of the Superman score led to the score being remastered in 5.1 sound for the special edition DVD release in 2001 as an isolated score track. This would lead to the next big step for the Superman film scores in 2008.

Not only did we get the full score for Superman, but it also included the complete scores for Superman II and III, and the world premiere of the soundtrack to Superman IV in any format. And even the soundtrack for the 1988 Ruby-Spears animated Superman series was included, which featured music by Ron Jones (who had worked on 44 episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation and the Starfleet Academy video game—and if you’ve not heard his work on “The Best of Both Worlds” and Film Score Monthly’s Ron Jones Project, another massive CD set, you owe it to yourself to do so!). To this day the FSM Blue Box is the only way to hear the Ruby-Spears score.

I had participated in a Talk City chat session in 2000 (and if you are old enough to remember Talk City on a WebTV dialup set box, then my hat’s off to you!) with Alexander Courage, Dennis McCarthy, and Don Davis about film music, and one of the questions he was asked was about Superman IV. He had said that he didn’t see the need for a soundtrack release because the music had been so repetitive. In all fairness, that’s true. Both he and Ken Thorne had used many of the same John Williams motifs in the same key and beat, so his assessment was a valid one. And yet the score featured more John Williams themes than before, with three new themes for the Nuclear Man, Lacy Warfield, and Jeremy (which is barely heard in the final film). And there had indeed been a soundtrack album for Superman IV planned, which would have mirrored the album for Superman III, with score music on the A side and source music from Paul Fishman on the B side. But with the failed film screening in Orange County, California, in June 1987, those plans were scrapped, and it would be 21 years before the full score was finally released. In a bittersweet moment, Alexander Courage was blessed to know just before his passing that year that his score was finally available for fans to enjoy, as it would have marked his big epic comeback at the time.

But just when you think we had heard it all, technology would again increase, thanks to Spotify and Amazon Music, among others. And our favorite film scores, along with all of our favorite music, would be available for us to stream on our smart TVs and iPhones. But it would not be the end for John Williams and Superman. 2018 and 2019, respectively, would see the re-release of the four Superman film scores in individual releases from LaLaLand Records, this time in reverse order, with Superman IV first, followed by a combined release of the Ken Thorne scores to II and III, and finally in February 2019 with the complete score for Superman.

What made these releases even better is that the actual original 24-track master tapes were located in a film vault. These were the actual tapes that were used back in 1978 when the scoring sessions occurred, and it also included an early version of “The Fortress of Solitude” than had never been released or heard until the new CD. In addition, all of John Williams’ source music for the film had been located and included on the Superman II-III CD, and it’s the only place where you can hear jazz combos, country music, church organs, rock and roll instrumentals, and even the iconic “Luthor’s Luau” (it goes nicely with your favorite pig roast). Another Navy grog, please!

To this day we have yet to see a stand-alone release of the Ron Jones score to the Ruby-Spears animated series. Mike Matessino, if you’re out there reading this, please please please make this happen!

Since then I’ve added more fully expanded scores to my collection. The complete versions of John Barry’s Dances with Wolves and Somewhere in Time. John Ottman’s complete score to Superman Returns. The 2012 CD set of Jerry Goldsmith’s complete score to Star Trek: The Motion Picture. James Horner’s score to Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Hans Zimmer’s 2-CD set to Man of Steel. And older John Williams CDs like the scores to The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones, and even Sabrina, a light romantic work. Some of these are like reuniting with old friends once again.

So needless to say I’m looking forward to Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny when it comes out. So many composers have left us, and it’s not much longer until we lose John Williams. That’s just simply how life goes. But I for one am so thankful that we still have the grand maestro with us to take Indy on his last big adventure.

(Some of the photographs in this blog are courtesy of CapedWonder.com.)