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Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone [Original Soundtrack]

John Williams - CD

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone John Williams CD
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  • Artist: John Williams
  • Format: CD
  • Year: 2001
  • Number of Discs: 1
  • UPC: 075678349126
  • Item Number: 67834912
  • Release date: 10/30/2001
  • 1. Prologue
  • 2. Harry's Wondrous World
  • 3. Arrival of Baby Harry
  • 4. Visit to the Zoo/Letters from Hogwarts
  • 5. Diagon Alley/The Gringotts Vault
  • 6. Platform Nine-And-Three-Quarters/The Journey to Hogwarts
  • 7. Entry into the Great Hall/The Banquet
  • 8. Mr. Longbottom Flies
  • 9. Hogwarts Forever!/The Moving Stairs
  • 10. Norwegian Ridgeback/A Change of Season
  • 11. Quidditch Match
  • 12. Christmas at Hogwarts
  • 13. Invisibility Cloak/The Library Scene
  • 14. Fluffy's Harp
  • 15. In the Devil's Snare/The Flying Keys
  • 16. Chess Games
  • 17. Face of Voldemort
  • 18. Leaving Hogwarts
  • 19. Hedwig's Theme
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Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone [Original Soundtrack] by John Williams on CD


As a fan of J.K. Rowling's massively popular Harry Potter books and the composer of some of the best fantasy/sci-fi film scores, John Williams was a natural choice to write the music for Chris Columbus' film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. His score captures the childhood mischief, magic, and adventure of the film and the books, mixing winding, soaring melodies with instrumentation that spans the delicately spooky to the darkly majestic. However, his work here won't necessarily dispel Williams' reputation as an occasionally light-fingered composer: one of the score's main motifs, a light-as-a-cobweb celesta melody most clearly stated in "The Arrival of Baby Harry" and "Hedwig's Theme," recalls the work of both Danny Elfman and Tchaikovsky, while some of the other melodies sound like they're just a few notes away from themes in his own Hook and Star Wars scores. Harry Potter's score also tends to repeat these main themes a little too often; fortunately they're reinterpreted fairly creatively from piece to piece. "Harry's Wondrous World" and "Visit to the Zoo and Letters from Hogwarts" are sweeping and lighthearted, while "In the Devil's Snare and the Flying Keys," "The Chess Game," and "The Face of Voldemort" close the score with a trio of menacing, climactic musical cues. In between are pretty, delicate moments like "Fluffy's Harp" and whimsical pieces like "Christmas at Hogwarts," which manages to combine the festive, carol-esque melody with the atmosphere of a school for witches and wizards. The pomp and circumstance of "The Quidditch Match" is probably the score's most typically Williams composition; a thrilling mix of his heroic style and the rest of the music's spooky, supernatural feel. Not surprisingly, considering that Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone runs nearly three hours long, Williams' score is on the long side, making it somewhat difficult to take in outside of the film's context. While it may not be one of his most inspired works, it's never less than perfectly appropriate and does include some brilliant moments. ~ Heather Phares, Rovi
  • Artist: John Williams
  • Format: CD
  • Year: 2001
  • Number of Discs: 1
  • UPC: 075678349126
  • Item Number: 67834912
  • Release date: 10/30/2001
  • Label: Atlantic
  • Genre: Stage & Screen, Classical, Holiday
  • Style: Soundtracks, Original Score, Halloween, Film Score, Contemporary
  • Album Time: 73:36

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  • Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone John Williams CD
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone John Williams CD

Editorial Reviews

For all but the most nitpicking Potterphiles out there, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone is nothing less than the perfect visual incarnation of J.K. Rowling's world of swooping owls and flying broomsticks. However, it's never precisely more than that, either; the very act of giving image and voice to these rich literary precepts places them in a realm inevitably less magical than the imagination. Still, it's hard to picture a more essentially faithful adaptation of Rowling's tone and story, which weighs in at a hefty two and a half hours despite streamlining some of the more vestigial elements of a quick 300-page read. Steve Kloves' adaptation of the wildly popular bestseller lingers less on some of the episodic Hogwarts' adventures, only briefly touching on such red herring plot points as the wise centaur and Hagrid's dragon. The eye-popping visuals have numerous other opportunities to shine, chief among them the grippingly rendered Quidditch match, in which players on broomsticks zoom and jockey like the speeder bikes of Endor in Return of the Jedi. It's no surprise that Harry Potter should occasionally invoke a Star Wars movie, since its hero is an orphaned boy who yearns for a destiny beyond what his aunt and uncle can provide, and who possesses unparalleled mystical powers that the dark side seeks to corrupt. The landscape Chris Columbus and cinematographer John Seale have created -- with its levitating banquet hall decorations, animated games of wizard chess, ominous trolls, and three-headed dogs -- is of equal vividness and complexity as that galaxy far, far away, and it should make just as much if not more money. Besides the film's many technical achievements, the actors really deliver, well beyond the who's who of British thespians who comprise the Hogwarts' teachers. Daniel Radcliffe has the look and reluctant heroism of Harry down perfectly, if a little too languidly; he's bested by Emma Watson's deliciously petulant and precocious Hermione, as well as the masterful line deliveries and comic timing of Rupert Grint as Ron. ~ Derek Armstrong, All Movie Guide