The score from The Empire Strikes Back was composed and conducted by John Williams. Between Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back, Williams had also worked with the London Symphony Orchestra for the scores to the films The Fury, Superman and Dracula. The score earned another Academy Award nomination for Williams. Again, the score was orchestrated by Herbert W. Spencer and Angela Morley, recorded by engineer Eric Tomlinson and edited by Kenneth Wannberg with supervision by Lionel Newman. John Williams himself took over duties as record producer from Star Wars creator George Lucas.
The soundtrack was first released in the United States as a 75-minute double LP five days before the film's premiere but the first Compact Disc release ran only half the length of the 2-LP set. Re-recordings of the score even included music that was not on the original CD soundtrack. A remastered version of the soundtrack was released by Walt Disney Records on May 4, 2018.
Contents
Background
The musical score of The Empire Strikes Back was composed and conducted by John Williams, and performed by the London Symphony Orchestra at a cost of about $250,000. Williams began planning in November 1979, estimating Empire required 107 minutes of score. For two weeks across eighteen three-hour sessions just after Christmas, Williams recorded the score at Anvil Studios and EMI Studios, London. Up to 104 players were involved at any one time, performing with instruments including oboes, piccolos, pianos, and harps.
History
In 1980, the disco label RSO Records released the film's original soundtrack in a double-album, with two long-playing (LP) records. Combined, the two records featured seventy-five minutes of film music. This double LP package also included a booklet presentation with pictures of the main characters and action sequences from the film. Featured at the booklet's end was an interview with John Williams about the music and the new themes, such as "The Imperial March (Darth Vader's Theme)" and "Yoda's Theme". It also included a brief explanation of each track. The front cover artwork featured Darth Vader's mask against the backdrop of outer space; and the back cover featured the famous Gone with the Wind version of the poster art. As a side note, this package marked the final time a double LP soundtrack set was ever issued (Episode VI, the final film to have an LP soundtrack released, had only a single disc, also released by RSO Records). A double-cassette edition was also released.
In the U.K., a single vinyl album and cassette were released in 1980 by RSO Records. This comprised only ten tracks, which were also re-arranged differently. For instance, the first track on the U.K. release is "The Imperial March" instead of the "Star Wars Main Theme". This track listing would be used for the album's first international CD release in 1985. Also unlike the U.S. version, this release did not have a booklet but the information (and some photographs) were replicated on the inner sleeve.
In 1985, the first Compact Disc (CD) release of the soundtrack was issued by Polydor Records, which had by that time absorbed RSO Records and its entire music catalog. As with the album's original U.K. vinyl and cassette release, this CD release reduced the music content from the seventy-five minutes featured in the 1980 U.S. double-album down to forty-two minutes.
In 1993, 20th Century Fox Film Scores released a special four-CD box set: Star Wars Trilogy: The Original Soundtrack Anthology. This anthology included the soundtracks to all three of the original Star Wars films in separate discs. The disc dedicated to The Empire Strikes Back restored almost all of the original seventy-five minutes from the 1980 LP version and included new music cues never released before for a total of nineteen tracks. On the fourth bonus disc, five additional tracks from Empire were included in a compilation of additional cues from the other two films. This CD release also marked the first time that the famous "20th Century Fox Fanfare" composed by Alfred Newman in 1954 was added to the track listing, preceding the "Star Wars Main Theme".
Track listing
First U.S. release on LP
First release on LP by RSO.
Total Time: 74:34
Original U.K. release and first international release on CD
First release on CD by Polydor.
"The Imperial March (Darth Vader's Theme)" – 3:00
"Yoda's Theme" – 3:27
"The Asteroid Field" – 4:10
"Han Solo and the Princess" – 3:26
"Finale" – 6:25
"Star Wars (Main Theme)" – 5:48
"The Training of a Jedi Knight" – 3:05
"Yoda and the Force" – 4:02
"The Duel" – 4:03
"The Battle in the Snow" – 3:48
Total Time: 41:23
Star Wars Trilogy: The Original Soundtrack Anthology
In 1993, 20th Century Fox Film Scores released a four-CD box set containing music from the original Star Wars trilogy. Disc two in the set was devoted to The Empire Strikes Back, with further tracks on disc four.
Note: Parts of tracks six and seventeen on this particular set have their left & right channels reversed).
The first part of track twenty-one, "Ewok Celebration (Film Version)", is from Return of the Jedi.
Special edition re-issue
In preparation for the 20th anniversary Special Edition releases of the original trilogy's films, 20th Century Fox spent four months, from April to July 1996, transferring, cleaning and preparing the original soundtracks for special two-disc releases. The original release, by RCA Victor in 1997, consisted of limited-edition books with laser etched CDs inside the front and back covers with each book. In the case of The Empire Strikes Back, the discs are etched with the logo for the Empire. The discs were given an unlimited release in a two-disc jewel case, also by RCA Victor later that year. They were again re-released in 2004 by Sony Music, with new artwork paralleling the original trilogy's first DVD release.
Recording information
Cue List
R1P1 Main Title
R1P2 The Imperial Probe
R1P2 New Start
R1P2 Insert Bar 80
R1P2 Insert #2 Bar 109
R1P3-R2P1 Luke's Escape
R2P2 Ben's Instruction
R2P3 Luke's Rescue
R2P4 The Probe Scanner
R3P1 Drawing the Battle Lines
R3P2 Leia's Instructions
R3P3 The Snow Battle
R3P4-R4P1 Luke's First Crash
R4P2 The Rebels Escape Again
R4P3 The Asteroid Field
R5P1 Crash Landing
R5P2 Yoda Appears
R5P3 Yoda's Entrance
R5P3 End Fix
R5P4-R6P1 Solo and the Princess
R6P2 Yoda's Teaching
R6P3 This is Not a Cave
R6P4 Training a Jedi
R6P5-R7P1 The Magic Tree
R7P2 Attack Positions
R7P3 Yoda Raises the Ship