Hello and welcome to this week's installment of Cue by Cue.
Today we're going to be listening to 9m1 Luke to the Rescue.
This cue is just 22 bars long and was orchestrated by Al Woodbury.
Here's the tops of the sketch and the orchestrated score. I actually have two scans of the orchestrated score, one with and one without the additional notes in marker:
Now let's listen to the cue together:
At 0:00 the cue begins with some magical sounding woodwinds, followed by a rousing horn statement of Luke's theme as he flies away from Dagobah.
This continues as the scene wipes to Bespin and we see an establishing shot of Cloud City, with a cloud car flying toward the camera.
The music goes quiet at 0:13. Based on the sketch note and the music here I think this shot might've been changed after scoring - perhaps due to unfinished vfx the version Williams scored seens to have just been the live action plate of Leia, because the sketch describes this shot as an interior and the music goes quiet despite still technically being an establishing shot. Unfortunately the storyboard I have for this shot doesn't have an "added" date on it so it's impossible to know for certain whether this was a vfx shot added after Williams scored the scene, or if it was always intended to be there but the live action plate was used as a placeholder.
Some quiet strings are joined with a couple harp flourishes as Leia paces back and forth, cello intro as Leia approaches Han at 0:24, which leads to a deep cello rendition of the love theme just after the kiss at 0:30.
This statement continues on the oboe at 0:46, but doesn't resolve, instead trailing off on a high pitched note as Chewbacca collects the broken pieces of C-3PO. Thus, the cue ends...
No picture edits appear to have been made between scoring and recording, and no music edits were made either - at least, in the theatrical cut.
The Special Edition makes some music edits due to added CGI footage.
In the Special Edition:
0:00-0:12 = 9m1 Luke to the Rescue 0:00-0:12
0:12-0:27 = 9m2 Vader Shows Up 1:17-1:32
0:27-end = 9m1 Luke to the Rescue 0:18-end
Despite not having a recording log, we know that this cue was recorded on the third day of the recording sessions, December 29, 1979, thanks to the note that says so on the orchestrated sheet. Unfortunately, I'm unsure how many takes were recorded, but according to the sketch the performance edit uses takes 64 and 67.
This cue has been officially released on one album:
3) In 1997 on RCA Victor's 2-CD Special Edition set
More specifically, 9m1 Luke to the Rescue can be heard:
From 0:00-1:00 of disc 2 track 7 "Betrayal at Bespin" on the 1997 album.
Thankfully this release is complete, has a clean opening and ending, and has the film mix.
Unfortunately, it does play at the wrong speed, but this can easily be corrected in an audio editor:
1997 set needs to be sped up by 0.600
For my edit above I used a speed corrected copy of the 1997 set.
That's all I have for today, thanks for reading! Feel free to leave any comments or questions.
Next week we'll be listening to 9m2 Vader Shows Up. See you then!