The Music of Star Wars

Books about music and other things I like.

Miss Baerg's Library

The Director of the Star Wars movies, George Lucas, worked together with John Williams to make sure that the music flowed well with each scene in the movie.

John Williams was born in 1932 and is one of the most well-known movie music composers. He wrote the music for the movies ET, Jaws, Indiana Jones, Harry Potter, Superman, Jurassic Park, and of course, the Star Wars movies.

Watch this 3-minute clip to see how the Director and Composer worked together. Notice the film playing up above the singers. This helped Williams make sure the tempo of the music matched the action happening in the film.

Activity Idea: try to recreate Darth Vader's Theme using Chrome Music Lab, or playing it on an instrument like the piano, recorder, or guitar. The next page shows you the music.

BTW: Miss Baerg misses you! Send me pics/videos!!

The first Star Wars movie, A New Hope, came out in 1977. John Williams wrote the music for all nine Star Wars films, the latest one being The Rise of Skywalker in 2019.

The Imperial March (also Darth Vader's Theme)

The Force Theme (also Obi Wan's Theme)

Many characters in the film have a musical theme that plays when they are on screen. Watch the following videos and listen carefully to the music. Can you hear the melodies that repeat themselves? Can you tell the difference between one theme and another?

Name

Safari may block some audio or video from playing automatically and ‘read to me’ will skip these. You can configure this in Safari’s preferences.