Hello and welcome to this week's installment of Cue by Cue. I've been waiting for this installment for a while, as we're going to be talking about one of my favorite cues from this score.
Today we're going to be listening to 5m1 Rev. A Home Destroyed. As I briefly mentioned last week, this is the second cue that resulted from a revision of the earlier 4m4 A Home Destroyed, which went unrecorded. I highly recommend reading last week's post for context before reading this one, as there is a lot of information overlap.
Both versions were orchestrated by Herbert Spencer. The original is 74 bars long, and the revision is 62 bars.
Here's what the start of the conductor's score looks like for both versions:
You'll notice that the revision doesn't have a title at the top, rather it has all these writings in the middle of the page instead. This is because it technically starts at bar 31 of the original cue, keeping the original numbering and everything; it seems to have been done in a rush. The first two measures shown on the page are blank, the actual first bar is in the third measure slot.
You can also see that originally it was thought that this split would be called 4m4A, but at some point it got rebalanced to 5m1. I'm not entirely sure what initiated this rebalance, but it is the beginning of a long cascade of rebalancings that will continue through most of the rest of the score.
I mentioned last week how 4m4 was split in two due to a shuffling of scenes, from the original 42->A42->B42->BB42->C42->D42, to the new 42->22->B42->BB42->C42->A42. I also mentioned how 4m4R scores the end of scene 42, but nothing else. Today's cue covers scenes B42, BB42, C42, and A42.
I also briefly described the measure changes from 4m4 to 5m1R. Here they are in more detail:
5m1R bars 1-12 = 4m4 bars 31-42. These start at the beginning of scene B42.
5m1R bars 13-16 = new bars 42A-D. These cover the end of scene B42, leading straight into BB42
5m1R bars 17-44 = 4m4 bars 43-71. These cover BB42 and C42.
5m1R bar 45 = new bar 72, a transitionary bar between scenes C42 and A42.
5m1R bars 46-61 = 4m4 bars 16-30. These cover A42.
5m1R bar 62 = new bar 30A, for a new ending.
So with that out of the way, let's listen to the revised cue together:
At 0:00 the cue starts with some very sad, almost funeral-like trumpet, with backing strings. This plays as the heroes walk around the remains of the ravaged sandcrawler, and try to piece together what happened.
Some revelation music starts to play around 0:29, as Luke realizes that they might be after the droids. This fades out around 0:47.
At 0:47 starts my favorite part of the cue. We get some panicky strings as Luke sprints towards his landspeeder in order to head home and check on his family. Curiously, this section for Luke sprinting (0:47-0:54), was not part of the original 4m4, it's the added bars 42A-D. I'm not sure what picture edit resulted in the need for these additional bars. Perhaps this sprinting shot was not in the earlier cut that John Williams scored?
Regardless, at 0:54 the rest of the orchestra joins in, building to a powerful statement of Ben's theme as Luke races home. The theme climaxes at 1:04, just before we see the reveal of the distant burning homestead.
The music grows more sad as we can see more of the damage, building into another statement of Ben's theme at 1:30, as Luke realizes he no longer has a choice but to go with Ben to Alderaan. The theme climaxes at 1:48 (this is the new bar 72), before immediately segueing into the Death Star motif (beginning 4m4 bar 16).
This leads straight into an Imperial theme statement at 1:55 for Vader and the officers walking down the hallway toward Leia's cell. At 1:58, a short statement of Leia's theme, and then some ominous music as Vader and the torture droid enter the cell. This climaxes with some drums as the door slams shut, with one last string note to end the cue. This string note is intended to segue directly into the start of 5m2R A Hive of Villainy, but we'll talk more about that next week.
This cue was recorded on March 9, 1977, the third day of the recording sessions. It was the second cue recorded that day, immediately after last week's cue. Five takes were recorded, numbered 59-63. According to the 1997 take log, the performance edit used takes 62 and 63.
This cue has been officially released on four different albums:
1) In 1977 on 20th Century Records' OST album
2) In 1993 on Arista Records' 4-CD Anthology box set
3) In 1997 on RCA Victor's 2-CD Special Edition set
4) In 2018 on Walt Disney Records' Remastered album (remastered OST rebuilt from scratch from the session masters)
More specifically, 5m1R A Home Destroyed can be heard:
From 0:00-end of track 12 "The Return Home" on the 1977/2018 albums
From 0:00-end of disc 1 track 8 "The Return Home" on the 1993 album
From 0:00-end of disc 1 track 9 "Burning Homestead" on the 1997 album.
All sets have clean openings and endings, although the 1997 set is brickwalled. As far as I can tell, all sets use the same takes. For the above video I just used the 2018 set.
That's all I have for today, thanks for reading! Feel free to leave any comments or questions.
Next week we'll be discussing 5m2 Rev. A Hive of Villainy. See you then!