When the New York Philharmonic plays the music of Jaws live to picture this month, conducted by Anthony Parnther, even those patrons who know the 1975 film will discover an unexpected intensity in their reactions. For John Williams’s Oscar-winning score heightens the terror of shark-infested waters to an even greater degree when performed by a full orchestra mere yards away from listeners.

These movies-with-live-music events have become immensely popular with major orchestras around the world. In fact, it was Williams himself who launched the trend by conducting his score for E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial live as Steven Spielberg’s 1982 classic unspooled at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles at a 20th-anniversary event in March 2002. Sobs were mixed with cheers as the film concluded on an emotional note, and those of us who were there will never forget the experience. 

Williams, now 92 and the most honored of all American film composers, is a favorite among many professional musicians, and not just those who regularly record his film scores in Los Angeles and London. A surprising number of today’s classical musicians were impressed by Williams’s music as children, some even crediting the composer of Schindler’s List and Raiders of the Lost Ark with their decision to make a career of playing symphonic music.

“When Star Wars came out in 1977, that was really one of the first big orchestral movie scores in a long time,” recalls New York Philharmonic bassoonist Roger Nye. “Those of us who had a musical bent already were drawn into the symphonic world even more. I knew then that I wanted to play in an orchestra and be surrounded by that sound.”

Violinist I-Jung Huang remembers watching the Harry Potter films while growing up in Taiwan, discovering the sense of magic that the composer conveyed in the first three. “I am a big fan of John Williams’s work,” she says. “His music always deeply contributes to the film and helps you remember the movie and its emotions. I especially love the score for Jurassic Park.”

Several movies with Williams scores — in addition to his classic Jaws — are now performed regularly in live-concert settings, including Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Superman, Raiders, E.T., Home Alone, Jurassic Park, the three Williams-scored Potters, all nine Star Wars saga films, and the Williams-arranged Fiddler on the Roof.

The New York Philharmonic inaugurated The Art of the Score series in 2013, but had already performed live-to-picture presentations of complete classic films as far back as 2006 (Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky) and 2011 (Bernstein’s West Side Story). In 2017 the Orchestra played no fewer than four of Williams’s Star Wars films over a three-week span.

Playing those often long and complicated musical passages in strict synchronization with the imagery can be a challenge. In some, the musicians wear earpieces that allow them to hear the “click track,” an audible metronome-like sound that keeps everyone in time. In others, it is the conductor who listens to the click track, or keeps time through visual cues displayed to him on the podium.

“Playing E.T. and Jurassic Park live at the New York Philharmonic have been two of my greatest musical experiences with the orchestra,” says Huang. “I have vivid memories of tearing up onstage during the performance, being touched by his music and what it expresses.” Bassoonist Nye cites another significant aspect of these presentations: “We’ve done some Harry Potter movies, and we’ve done Home Alone at Christmastime. That always brings in families. I love to see parents bringing their kids, and I think, ‘Gosh, this could be the first time this young person has heard a live symphony orchestra!’”

Jaws is only the first in this season’s live-to-film offerings. On the horizon:

• Elf, with Justin Freer conducting John Debney’s score, December 19–22
• Back to the Future, with David Newman conducting Alan Silvestri’s score, March 19–22
• Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, with Sarah Hicks conducting John Williams’s score, June 11–14

Learn more here.

Jon Burlingame, a Los Angeles–based film music historian, is the author of seven books on film and television music, and teaches in the film-scoring program at the University of Southern California.