Tommy Johnson article

[Ace]

I'm too lazy to search the archives. Has this been posted before? It's a nice article.

http://musicandculture.blogspot.com/sea ... on%2C+tuba" target="_blank

[eupher61]

my understanding has been that TJ wasn't on the Close Encouters tracks at all. Jim Self was THE Mother Ship, right?

Incidentally, I was just at Devil's Tower over the holiday weekend!

[The Big Ben]

Interesting point from the article relating to the recent discussion about warm ups:

Tommy showed up a little late for the recording date for 'Jaws". The conductor and orchestra were waiting for him when he came in the door. He was out of breath and just pulled his horn out of its case, plugged in the mouthpiece, sat down, opened the book (which he had never seen before) and nailed the complex solo at the beginning of the piece. What a pro.

[Bandmaster]

my understanding has been that TJ wasn't on the Close Encouters tracks at all. Jim Self was THE Mother Ship, right?

When I was taking lessons from Jim while I was at CSULB back in 1977, he told me that the big scene with the mother ship talking to the scientists on the ground was played by the Los Angeles Tuba Quartet. Tommy was a member of that quartet.

[poomshanka]

Both Tommy and Jim recorded cues for the Mothership sequence. Decisions were made in post-production as to which cues synced up best with the visual effects. It wasn't until the movie came out that they realized almost everything that made it into the final cut was from Jim's sessions.

Also, if anyone hasn't seen it, a PDF of the program from Tommy's memorial concert is posted here:

http://www.tommyjohnson.org

Some nice pictures and remembrances in there...

...D