What is meant when people say that John Williams' style is too American? I don't understand this, American symphonic music is actually very young and is influenced greatly by outside sources. The American style comes in large part from the rest of society. I guess if it were like Buckaroo Holiday by Copland, I would understand, but this is different. What is so blatantly American and exclusionary to the other symphonic traditions? And for anyone that cares, the opening ceremony (I know it wasn't Williams') contained music from other cultures, like a spanish piece written by a russian. I'm just curious of how Williams is too American, he seems to have plenty of other influences to me.

> What is meant when people say that John Williams' style is too American? I
> don't understand this, American symphonic music is actually very young and
> is influenced greatly by outside sources. The American style comes in
> large part from the rest of society. I guess if it were like Buckaroo
> Holiday by Copland, I would understand, but this is different. What is so
> blatantly American and exclusionary to the other symphonic traditions? And
> for anyone that cares, the opening ceremony (I know it wasn't Williams')
> contained music from other cultures, like a spanish piece written by a
> russian. I'm just curious of how Williams is too American, he seems to
> have plenty of other influences to me.

Finally!! Someone who isn't an idiot and realizes that symphonic music comes from Europe, not America. There is very little in Williams' Olympic theme that is strictly "American."

> Finally!! Someone who isn't an idiot and realizes that symphonic music
> comes from Europe, not America. There is very little in Williams' Olympic
> theme that is strictly "American."

In fact, you can tell there are influences in his work from many of the classical European composers such as Dvorak or mabey even a littel Gustav Mahler. And without a doubt his style is very similar to Erich Korngold, a German composer. Music is a universal language. It doesn't matter who wrote what or what style it is in. Good music is just plain good music.