The soundtrack for the film has actually been issued numerous times. The original issue was a recording of concert arrangements based on the film's music. Later issues contain the actual soundtrack cues as heard in the film, although most cues are alternates originally recorded for the film, but replaced by new cues. The score was recorded at the MGM Scoring Stage in Culver City, California. On the track "The Magic of Halloween," when E.T. sees a child wearing a Yoda costume, Williams includes a reference to "Yoda's Theme", which he had composed for The Empire Strikes Back in 1980. George Lucas made the final link when he included three E.T.s as a member of the senate in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace and thereby semiconneting the two movies.
There are almost 80 minutes of music excluding alternates and album arrangements recorded just for the film. In paper the total number of full score excluding instrument parts excess well over 500 pages. The music was first written on a sketch to later be handed to orchestrator Herbert W. Spencer, who pencilled out the full score from December 1981 to January 1982. The orchestra consist of that of a usual standard orchestra with variations, e.g. the end credits consist of 3 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 3 bassoons, 4 horn in f, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, 1 tuba, percussion section, 1 harp, 1 piano and string section. Other parts of the movie required additional instruments such as celeste and organ. During the recording several of the woodwind players also play doubles between their own instrument and piccolo flute, English horn, and Eb clarinet, and contra bassoon. Several revisions to the music were made before the final film score was ready. Some of the original versions of the music would end up on the original soundtrack album along with new recordings while others would end up on either the 1996 or 2002 releases before La La Land Records finally released the original film score including all alternate versions of the cues were presented as bonus material. One of the known anecdotes from the recording is that John Williams had problems with timing of the music during the recording of the finale chase which made Steven Spielberg shut the projector and asked John Williams to record the music as he wanted it. Spielberg later edited the scenes around the recorded music.
Track listing
Awards
The score was the fourth in history to accomplish the feat of winning the Academy Award, Golden Globe, Grammy, and BAFTA. To date, a total of only six scores have won all four awards.
Dvořák's ''Dumky'' trio
Many observers have noted that the E.T. theme music sounds extremely similar to a passage near the end of Czech composer Antonín Dvořák's Dumky trio, leading some to accuse Williams of "stealing" the music. However, others have pointed out that it is not an uncommon practice for contemporary composers to borrow from classical music.
