One more post before I finish packing. If you're planning to attend the Oakland performance of The Lord of the Rings in Concert: The Fellowship of the Ring, but haven't yet purchased your tickets, here's a great way to save a few bucks!

Act fast; the offer expires this Saturday.

The Lord of the Rings In Concert: The Fellowship Of The Ring 

Saturday, October 22 at 2:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m.Oracle Arena, Oakland Middle Earth Has Never Sounded So Good! The Lord of the Rings In Concert: The Fellowship of the Ring is the groundbreaking first installment of Peter Jackson's Oscar-winning film trilogy.  

Featuring Howard Shore’s complete Academy Award^® and Grammy^®–winning score performed live on-stage by more than 250 musicians with the film projected on an immense 60-foot screen.  Entertainment Weekly calls it "High Class Geekery" and The San Francisco Examiner exclaims "It's The Concert of the Decade."

Save $5 on tickets with code 1RING!*Get tickets at Ticketmaster or call 800-745-3000.

Not valid on VIP seating. Valid on new ticket purchases only. Limit of 10 tickets per person. Valid on full priced tickets only. No double discounts. Valid online or at the Oracle Arena Box Office only for performances on October 22. Offer expires October 1, 2011. 

 Ok, one more bit of news this week:

Howard Shore's score to A Dangerous Method will be released in the UK on September 16. The US release will be close on its heels, but nearer to the film's release in the States. The album includes Shore's original score, and concludes Wagner's "Siegfried Idyll" as arranged for piano by Shore and performed by Lang Lang.

Tracklist is below. UK orders can be placed HERE (and listen to the samples while you're there). US, as noted, is forthcoming.


1. Burghölzli
2. Miss Spielrein
3. Galvanometer
4. Carriage
5. He's Very Persuasive
6. Sabina
7. Otto Gross
8. A Boat with Red Sails
9. Siegfried
10. Freedom
11. End of the Affair
12. Letters
13. Confession
14. Risk My Authority
15. Vienna
16. Only One God
17. Something Unforgivable
18. Reflection
19. Siegfried Idyll (Wagner)

Chicago in Review

I love the Chicago Symphony. It’s not only my “home symphony,” it’s one of the best in the world. I’ve watched this ensemble my whole life, and have performed with many of the players over the years. I love the heritage and the well-honed, sharp-toothed sound they bring to everything they play. When it was announced that Fellowship would play at Ravinia, I knew immediately that Ludwig Wicki would evince a completely unique sound from the orchestra. Howard Shore’s music has such a particular sense of voicing. His Rings music is really built on intersecting blocks of sound. In many ways, that’s the key to the ancient/modern sound. The blocks themselves have a Germanic sense of weight and gravity, but the interaction has a sort of smooth, delicate French/Italian flavor. It’s the “orchestration by ranges” approach we discus in the book. The CSO is such a lucid orchestra, and Wicki knew exactly how to use that clarity in service of Shore’s precise, contained sound. It’s was a remarkable pairing!

Ravinia presents the best that festival atmospheres offer. A concert like this brings out families, dates, wild-haired hippies, buttoned-down businessmen. It’s quite a diverse sea of humanity! Nearly 20,000 people attended over the course of the two performances. Our supply of books sold out approximately 10 minutes into the second night, so I spent the rest of the evening signing programs, ticket stubs, wine bottles, and arms! I’m glad the people that weren’t able to get their hands on a copy of the book were good natured about it, and I hope they’ll head off to Amazon ASAP!

I was actually shocked at how many people lined up for the book … including many people from the blog and from Twitter who came to say “hello!” The Tolkien gang from last spring’s Wheaton lectures was there as well, but perhaps the biggest surprise of the evening was the appearance of my translator from Poland in 2009. He was in the States for a trip to New York, but had seen the concert in Chicago advertised and decided to reroute his schedule. If that’s not a testament to the power of this music, I don’t know what is.

September should be a good month around these parts. I'll be back with a couple of announcements later down the line, and of course, you all know about Shore's Lord of the Rings Symphony being released on September 13 (available right HERE on Amazon). And if you'd like to hear the performance a few days early, Bavarian Radio Klassik will be broadcasting the entire work on Sunday, September 4 at 4:00 (local German time). Details and links will be located on the BR-KLASSIK home page.

Before I wrap this post up, please enjoy a couple of video from the Chicago Fellowship performance. Many thanks to Guillaume for sending these in!


See you soon for more announcements!

Secondary dealers are currently offering FOTR: CR for $479.99 on Amazon. Let's watch how high the price soars before people realize that it'll be back in stock in the near future.

I'm hoping both to see the price careen over $1000.00 and, more importantly, for NO ONE to be taken in by the scam. Spread the word. Please don't let anyone spend unwisely!

The Music of the Lord of the Rings Films is now available at the official Warner Brothers online shop. Gift-box options are available.

Nothing much to report, I just thought that was kind of cool!

Alexander Publishing is now selling The Music of the Lord of the Rings Films with a healthy discount, and since the site's write-up is so very kind, I'm going to reprint bits of it here along with the link.

The full title of this book is The Music of The Lord of The Rings Films: A Comprehensive Account of Howard Shore’s Scores With CD. It’s the subtitle that tells the real story - a comprehensive account of Howard Shore’s Scores. For film composers and students of film composition, there hasn’t been a book of this caliber and depth since Henry Mancini’s Case Study of a Film Score: The Thorn Birds. I would place the work done by Doug Adams on Howard Shore’s work, the film music equivalent of what Donald Francis Tovey did for Beethoven. The book is that rich.

[...]

Don’t be fooled by the coffee table look and feel of the book. This is a serious work. And the story line/compositional analysis of each theme is more than you’d ever get in a film scoring class. 

Alexander Publishing's home page is available here, and The Music of the Lord of the Rings is available here. If you're still on the fence about purchasing the book -- in which case I tip my hat to you, since it's rare I encounter someone who makes decisions more slowly than I do! -- this could be the right time to pull the trigger ...

Quick update from Amazons around the world: The Music of the Lord of the Rings Films is now officially back in stock and ready to ship at Amazon France. Apologies for the delay, but there was also a good bit of behind-the-scenes effort to make sure that well doesn't run dry again. So to those of you on that part of the globe I say, have at it!

Meanwhile, heading westward, Amazon UK now has The Music of the Lord of the Rings Films discounted by a generous 25%.

... OK, I know this commerce talk is less exciting than casting announcements, etc. But if you're getting an early start on holiday shipping, it's probably good to keep an eye on such things!

-- Those in Europe should click over to Chappell of Bond's site where you can order a pre-signed copy of the book.

I've heard from a handful of people having difficulty putting Barnes & Noble orders through. Please retry your orders. There was a temporary bug on B&N's end that caused them to cancel.

I don't think the problem was widespread, but figured I'd post a heads-up just in case.

Thanks!

We are now officially up and available for pre-orders at Amazon sites around the world!


Amazon has also created an author page for me here ... which up until this morning claimed I had also written a book about Civil War guns! (You should have seen the behind-the-scenes panic on that one!)

Barnes and Noble has the book available on their excellent site as well. See here.

Please note, some of these sites are currently listing as incorrect release date. These are being fixed as I type. The release dates are still exactly as listed in the press release: "available in the European Union on September 28 and in the U.S. and worldwide on October 5, 2010."

Remember, if none of these dealers is near you, see the FAQ and have your local bookshop contact the distributors directly.

I've just spent an afternoon doing press, so I'm a bit rundown and will address emails and posts as quickly as possible. Thanks for your patience!

It's funny ... this is all suddenly feeling quite real! Exhausting and exciting in equal measure!

The headline says it all. Canadian residents, please click here; those hailing from the United Kingdom, please click here. I'm expecting more pre-sale sites to go active in the near future. If you catch them before I do, please feel free to post!

Meanwhile, Alfred, our intrepid distributors, have put up their own page for the book today as well.

A very exciting day around here, I must say!

If you've not already noticed, The Music of the Lord of the Rings Films is now available for pre-order at the US Amazon store. I'd expect other Amazon sites around the globe to follow suit, and will do my best to keep everyone updated as that happens. As you can probably guess, my blog/email time is slightly constrained right now, but it's an exciting time around here!

Back soon!

-Doug



AVAILABLE FOR PRE-ORDER AT AMAZON US

Thank you all so much for your incredible support, both over the years and, more specifically, during this very exciting week. I am overwhelmed.

One journey is over, and another is just beginning. The jury's still out on which will ultimately be more demanding. Is it more difficult to stay focused over an extended period of slow steady work, or during a few short months of furious pace? I guess I'll let you know!

But in case I get bogged down in this or that, I wanted to give you a short laundry list of what you'll soon see announced -- if for no other reason than to slightly stem the tide of questions.

The Official 'Coming Soon' List:

Book Preview Pages
Rarities CD Tracklist
Book Pricing
Pre-Order Routing

Please understand, on this new journey, these announcements are governed by other captains. If I don't give you the information you're looking for in timely manner, I'm probably not being cagey. I simply may not know! Funny, isn't it? I finally adopt a position of full transparency, only to find I'm no longer holding all the cards! :)

Actually, this is just a typical marketing phase. And in that world information is dispensed at a very specific rate. We always forget -- and yes, I do mean "we" since I'm as guilty of this as anyone -- but marketing is seldom directed at the pre-informed/pre-sold audience. The marketing team behind this book doesn't need to focus too intently on the LOTR/film music crowd. We know why this music matters. It now needs to reach the uninitiated. They know how to do that, and I'm quite content to let them do their jobs unhindered by my pestering. That means I'm not always privy to dates and timelines, but that's OK. I've been told that August will be a quieter month for us, then September will kick us back to high gear.

However, for "we" the dedicated, I'll soon be updating the FAQ to explain a few things. I think there's still plenty to be said about the Rarities disc and how decisions were made -- the track titles alone aren't going to tell you that. It's a fascinating collection of materials you've never heard before at all, materials that you've heard before in part, pieces that never made it to the CRs, early versions of themes and compositions, etc. You'll see. I really love it because it works both as an archive -- something you can study to gain a greater understanding of Shore's creative process -- and as a beautiful album -- something you can pop in the car for a long ride. But more on that at the appropriate date.

I also want to give you a little information on the book's content and sections. Does it include the material from the liners? The Annotated Score? All new material? (1. Yes, thoroughly expanded; 2. Yes, expanded and restructured; 3. Yes, quite a bit!) The upcoming preview pages will make this a bit clearer as well, and those are coming soon.

Finally, we're still working on a few additional public appearances and signings, and I'll let you know when those are confirmed. However, do note that the September 27 event in London and the October 7 event in New York are our main events right now. I'd be completely thrilled to see as many of you there as is possible! And after so much support over the years, I think you really deserve to be there on day one. I don't know anything more about these events than what's in the press release, but when/if additional details reach me, I'll be sure to pass them on. However, I will say this:

-If you wish to have a book signed at the event in London on September 27, you will probably need to buy your book at the event itself. A pre-ordered book shouldn't be able to reach you beforehand since the book won't actually be in wide release until the day after this event.

-If you're hoping to have a book signed at the B&N event in NY on October 7, you probably have a little more leeway. Technically, our US street date is two days before this event. If you trust shipping times -- and if said times coincide properly with your own travel plans -- pre-order away.

-If you're hoping to have a book signed at either the RAH or RCMH concerts, you may be safe placing a pre-order or swinging by an old brick-and-mortar, so it's your call. We will have the book available at the concerts themselves, so take that into consideration.


And that's pretty much what I know at the moment. It's an incredibly rewarding, exciting, nerve-wracking time for me, but I wouldn't trade it for the world.

Oh yes, I should mention ... This Tuesday morning I received an email from Shore's office. "Let us know when you receive yours today." Somewhat confused I stumbled out to the porch. At some point during the night or early morning a delivery had been made. I opened up the box, for the first time ever, held the finished book in my hands.

It is beautiful.

That's just one of a thousand moments I'd never have had without your support. I can never, ever thank you enough.

D

With press releases, pre-orders, and (potentially) some Hobbit/MGM news due this month, I think we'll have plenty to discuss as the summer heat begins to beat down!

Have at it below!

A quick reminder that Howard Shore's score to Eclipse is available on CD today. Click here and brave the mighty Amazon!

Aint It Cool News (beloved/despised bastion of pop culture) has recommended the LOTR Complete Recordings in their 2007 Holiday Shopping Guide. I wish they hadn't flubbed the "every single note ever recorded" bit, but I suppose next year will clarify.