music composed & played by guitaristJohn Williams

Emma's themePlayed on the flute bySebastian Bell

Songs

"When a Boy from Alabama meets a Girl from Gundagai"(J. O'Hagen), Joy Nicholscourtesy EMI Records

"Save a Little Sugar"(Gert & Daisie), Elsie & Doris Waterscourtesy EMI Records

"My Devotion"(Hillman-Napton), Geraldo & his Orchestracourtesy EMI Records

"Heaven Can Wait"(Van Heusen), George Trevare & his Bandcourtesy EMI Records

"I'll Never Smile Again"(R. Lowe), Geraldo & his Orchestracourtesy EMI Records

"Deh! Non Ti Incantan"(Wagner), from LohengrinSung by Aureliane Pertile V.

"Vienna Blood"(Johann Strauss),Willi Boskovsky Conducting the Vienna Philharmoniccourtesy the Decca Record Co. Ltd.

"Moonlight Serenade"(Parish & Miller), Joe Loss & his Orchestracourtesy EMI Records

"Quintett in A"KV 581 (Mozart), Stadler Quintettcourtesy Deutsche Grammophon

"Mr. Ripley"(Davidson Trevare)courtesy EMI Records

"C'est Si Facile De Vous Aimer"Cole Porter, (Adapted by Henneve/Palex),Sung by Josephine BakerCourtesy EMI Records

"Our Love Affair"(Freed - Edens), Harry Roy and his Bandcourtesy EMI Records

"Chattanoonga Choo Choo"(Gordon-Warren), Joe Loss & his Orchestracourtesy EMI Records

The soundtrack is an interesting and eclectic collection of works, including the notable presence of Sebastian Bell playing the main theme on flute. Bell was amongst the finest of British flute players and teachers. He has an obituary at The Guardian here and at The Independent here.

(Below: Sebastian Bell, Soo-Kyung Park and Jeanne Baxtresser)

Amongst the period tunes is one featuring the work of the immortal Jack O’Hagan - he and his works are listed at Trove here:

Composer John Williams:

Guitarist John Williams has a wiki site here and an eponymous website here.

Williams’ career is far too lengthy and wide-ranging to detail here. For those interested in pursuing the artist’s career in detail, he had an authorised biography written about him by William Starling, and there’s a site here which details many of the salient points of his life, over four decades of music-making…

This excerpt from the lengthier outline of Williams’ career positions his work on the film in the context of other activities during the early to mid-1980s. The highlighted links refer back to the site for more information:

In 1980, after returning from a solo tour of Australia in the spring, despite (or perhaps, because of) his eclectic perfoming schedule, he was awarded the Order of the British Empire by the Queen, one of the highest honours available to non-British citizens (although he's lived most of his life in England, Williams proudly remains an Australian national), although he has never used the title and the fact is not mentioned in his short biographies.Although Sky was to be the main focus of Williams' activities for the next five years, he maintained a steady output, making his usual new recordings every year, of Boccherini Quintets with the London String Quartet (1980), a solo Albéniz album (1981), and possibly one of the strangest duets ever, that of guitar and organ with Peter Hurford (1982). He also duetted on stage with "folk" singer Ralph McTell during a benefit concert for The Samaritans at Christmas 1982. All of these recordings were accompanied by public performances of the material, so despite the British media's interest in Sky, John Williams remained steadfastly true to his core repertoire. During his 1981 trip to Australia, he met someone who was to have an uncredited but huge influence on his work afterwards, luthier Greg Smallman. Smallman guitars have been Williams' main instrument both on the concert platform and in recordings ever since.Furthermore, in the summer of 1983 he found time away from a busy schedule with Sky's UK, European and Far East tours not only to record another album with Cleo Laine and perform at the Wavendon Festival, but to re-form John Williams and Friends and release an album of folk tunes, Carlos Bonnell's place in the lineup taken by close friend (and London neighbour) Paco Peña, and Gerald Garcia. The ensemble toured extensively throughout the UK and Europe over the next three years.After a Christmas concert coinciding with the release of Sky's sixth album at the end of 1983, he decided to leave Sky and returned to his classical roots with a passion. In September at the Royal Festival Hall, he premiered a new work by Patrick Gowers, The Stevie Concerto, based on material written for the

soundtrack of Stevie in 1978, a film about the English poetess Stevie Smith.In 1984 he was invited to be Artistic Director of the South Bank Summer Music Festival. This annual event had been created in 1968 by Daniel Barenboim, whose idea was to form a programme of events to rival the mighty Proms, with the emphasis on variety and smaller ensembles and soloists, whose talents could not be appreciated in the massive Albert Hall across the Thames, organised by a musician rather than a bureaucratic committee. The season was a tremendous success, both in artistic and financial terms, with Williams making a great many appearances himself and surrounding himself by friends such as Paco Peña, Cleo Laine, the Medici Quartet, Peter Hurford and others.On 2nd October, he performed the premiere of Takemitsu's concerto for guitar and oboe d'amore Vers l'arc-en-ciel, with Simon Rattle and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, a work the Japanese composer was commissioned to write for this orchestra, and which Williams recorded in 1992 with the London Sinfonietta. He was to return to Birmingham two years later for a live broadcast of the Concierto de Aranjuez with Rattle and the CBSO to mark the Tenth Anniversary of the National Exhibition Centre, a multimmedia extravaganza with flashing lights and lasers, bringing the presentation of classical music world even closer to the world of rock'n'roll. The concert was staged in the NEC's Arena, one of the largest indoor venues in Britain (seating some 17,000) and usually more accustomed to the presentation of rock concerts. Williams was evidently at ease in these surroundings, partially from his experiences with Sky, but the same cannot be said of the audience, most of whom seemed to have no idea what to expect...In 1985 he returned to run the South Bank Summer Festival, and with an even more versatile programme of events (many of which again featured him), including many workshops and lectures for younger audiences on topics like the history and variety of guitars, percussion instruments (run by Sky drummer Tristan Fry), and others, brought the South Bank Centre back to a prominent position in the British arts sceneWilliams was asked to run the Festival again in 1986 but he declined, taking a stand against the abolition by Margaret Thatcher's government of the Greater London Council, responsible for the funding of the South Bank Centre. Instead, he toured Spain with the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields and made a highly successful American tour. He also gave a recital in Paris at the Salle Pleyel and took part in the Classic Aid concert in Geneva, masterminded by Lorin Maazel in aid of the United Nations Fund for Refugees. He was also asked to score a small Australian film called Emma's War, one of the few examples of Williams' own compositions.1987 was to prove not only his busiest year since leaving Sky, but also one of the most varied. He opened the year as Artistic Director of the Melbourne Arts Festival, returning to the UK for a tour with John Williams and Friends. He then undertook a summer tour with the National Youth Jazz Orchestra, presenting the latest in his not quite classical commissions: Paul Hart's Concerto for Guitar and

Jazz Orchestra.To make a busy year even busier, the self-avowed non-jetsetter appeared at the Toronto International Guitar Festival, performing the world premiere of Leo Brouwer's Fourth Concerto, composed for him, which was to be one of the centrepieces of a recording for Sony Classical The Black Decameron a decade later.(Below: John Williams at the age of 16 in 1957, and performing in 1979, and on the cover of one of his many recordings).

Music from the film was released on an LP:

(Below: track details and cover art detail)

The main theme for the film (by John Williams) could be found on a CD devoted to British film music, despite both Williams and the film being Australian.