501st Legion, did you hear that? Stormtroopers get their own theme, amongst many others, and Obi-Wan Kenobi composer Natalie Holt talks with The Hollywood Reporter about her time writing the score for the hotly anticipated Disney Plus series, her prior work on the superb Loki and where her work sits in the pantheon of Star Wars scores…oh, and of course the maestro John Williams.
There’s a long history of Star Wars composers. Where within that timeline and on that sliding scale of experiences do you think your work falls?
I probably had a more similar journey to John Powell or Michael Giacchino in the world of my Star Wars experience, because it was steeped in the historical heritage characters. Whereas, Ludwig [Göransson] had a kind of new landscape to work with, so he was able to carve out a bit more. He managed to set his own musical tone with what he was doing [in The Mandalorian] just a bit more away from the cannon. Powell had a theme written by John Williams, who wrote a theme for the Han Solo movie as well. I got to meet him actually at the SCL Awards and it was just great to have a bit of camaraderie. He said you get a Star Wars job and it’s this thing that you’ve grown up with as a kid — and John Williams is John Williams — so it’s overwhelming and it takes you a hot minute to just get your head around it. (Laughs.) [Obi-Wan Kenobi director] Deborah Chow as well said this about just finding the tone and the balance of the Star Wars that we’ve known and then doing something fresh and a bit more your own identity within it.
On projects for Marvel and Lucasfilm, composers frequently have the task of scoring for both individual characters and ensembles. You can also be, beyond themes, scoring for specific places. How much were you juggling for Obi-Wan?
I did a suite for Loki where I had the Mobius and the TVA theme, and the Kang theme. So, yes, you have your hero theme and then you branch out from that. Obviously, John Williams has written the Obi theme, but I did start off trying to write one, to be honest. I was writing from Deborah’s instructions and it was interesting. She was like, “He’s in the desert. He’s lost, he’s been alone.” It’s like anything for his theme would just be small, crumbling, fragmented and thin. Then it would grow as he goes on this journey. That was kind of interesting seeing the place that I arrived at, just for the world and his environment. Obviously, there are lots of different characters in the show, and I did also write music themes for planets. In addition, there is a Stormtroopers theme. That’s all I can say right now.
Did you have a chance to work directly with Williams for this?
We didn’t collaborate, but I did get to use his theme. He didn’t have very long and it was quite last minute whether he’d have time or not. But he really wanted to write that theme because he was the one character that he didn’t write the theme for in the original movie. So I think he had this feeling that he wanted to complete the challenge. I think he had two weeks and he came on board and wrote the Obi theme and a suite, which is the main title, and then a few variations of how the Obi theme can work. That was what he had time to give the project, and it was just a gift. It’s so perfect and in a way, once I had that Obi theme, it set the tentpoles up for the project.
- Hardcover Book
- Golden Books (Author)
- English (Publication Language)
- 24 Pages - 09/20/2022 (Publication Date) - Golden Books (Publisher)
