John Williams brings rare Marine Band concerts to CD on June 19
Naxos will issue john williams and “The President’s Own” Vol. 1 & 2 on June 19, putting two Marine Band concerts on CD for the widest physical availability yet. The set gathers performances led by Williams with the United States Marine Band, including material that had first reached listeners as a free download.
Kennedy Center, July 12, 2003
The first concert was held at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. on July 12, 2003, a day after the Marine Band’s 205th anniversary. Its program ran through Williams’ film and concert repertoire, with selections from Star Wars, E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, Schindler’s List, The Cowboys, the Harry Potter series, Catch Me If You Can, the Olympic fanfare, the theme to JFK, and “Sound the Bells!”
“Sound the Bells!” dates to 1993, when Williams wrote it for the marriage of the Japanese crown prince and princess. On CD, that older program arrives with less of Williams’ spoken commentary than listeners heard in the earlier release, so the new edition gives buyers the performances in a tighter package rather than the full event as presented in 2018.
Marine Band’s 210th anniversary
The second concert came five years later at the Kennedy Center for the Marine Band’s 210th anniversary, and it broadened the set beyond the earlier film cues. Williams and the band played themes from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Superman, The Sugarland Express, 1941, and The Terminal, along with “Liberty Fanfare,” which Williams wrote for the centennial of the Statue of Liberty in 1986.
The disc closes with a special 2013 recording of Williams with the Marine Band, a rousing rendition of an original composition he wrote for the ensemble’s 215th anniversary. That last track gives the release an extra archival layer: the set is not just repackaging two concerts, but collecting three separate moments from Williams’ work with the band across a decade.
From free download to CD
The physical edition also drops a performance of a then-new piece from the fourth Indiana Jones film that appeared in the 2008 concert. That omission makes the CD edition narrower than the earlier free download, but it also makes the June 19 release the cleanest retail version yet for collectors who want the Marine Band material on disc.
For listeners who want the performances in a physical format, this is the version to buy. For everyone else, the practical change is simple: material that once lived as a free download is now moving into a widely available commercial release, with two Kennedy Center concerts and the 2013 recording packaged together under Naxos’ banner.
