Today's piece is titled "A Hymn to New England" by John Williams.

This attractive three-minute work is a combination of an occasional piece and a film score. It is built from a fanfare motive and a particularly warm example of a typical John Williams film theme of the warmhearted kind.

The decade of the 1970s was John Williams' break out as the leading Hollywood film composer with his scores to Jaws, Superman, and Star Wars. It then saw him establish himself as one of America's most important light music conductors when he gained the podium of the Boston Pops Orchestra to replace the legendary Arthur Fiedler.

That appointment seems to have brought with it an important new career: Composer of celebratory occasional pieces, which he began to do with a couple of pieces commemorating the Pops and a piece (Jubilee 350) marking the anniversary of Boston's founding. Soon he was writing new pieces for all sorts of events, including a number of works for successive Olympic Games.

This one served to open a new theater in Boston, the Mugar Omni Theater at Boston's Museum of Science. It seems to be the practice for Omnimax theaters to film a short scenic film about the region where their theaters are located for their opening programs, and Williams wrote this music for such a production.

This work begins with a brass figure that is rather genial and unbombastic as fanfares go before settling down into a warm statement of the main theme. The work is in a simple song form, and rises to a strong conclusion combining the theme and the fanfares.

Vote today for your favorite John Williams work to be played on the show!

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(FYI: the picture features a waterfall in new england) ;)