NBC Nightside was NBC’s second overnight newscast. The program started in 1991 and was produced in Charlotte, North Carolina by the NBC News Channel. That, by the way, is not the same as MSNBC. It is the service, comparable to a wire service, that provides customized reports and video of national news to NBC affiliates. Some of Nightside’s many anchors included Antonia Mora and Campbell Brown. While the program was financially profitable and did well in the ratings, it was discontinued in 1999 because NBC wanted to use the overnight timeslot to air repeats of Jay Leno and Conan O’Brien. The theme is composed by Michael Karp.

In 1987 the Today Show expanded to six days a week: Sunday through Friday. To differentiate the Sunday edition from the weekday edition, a synthesized theme was used in conjunction with the regular open from The Mission. While it played, notable video from the previous week was shown. The theme, which has that unmistakable 80′s sound, was also used as a close. The show was anchored from Washington, DC by Garrick Utley and Maria Shriver and the weather was done by someone who Today audiences would get to know quite well over the years: Al Roker. The program shared a studio with Meet the Press. In 1992 Today expanded to 7 days a week and the magazine-style format that Sunday Today used was dropped.

This is another cue from The Mission by John Williams. NBC selected it as the opening for NBC News at Sunrise, which was the network’s early morning newscast that had debuted in 1983 with Connie Chung as anchor. Around 1996 News at Sunrise replaced its open with the Nightly News open. The program left the airwaves in 1999, being replaced with Early Today.

When composing this theme and the other cues for The Mission, Williams talked a lot about it with director Steven Spielberg. That led to a surprise on the day of the recording. Former NBC News executive Tom Wolzien, who had selected Williams to compose a new set of themes for NBC News, explains: “On the morning of the recording session when I got to the Paramount stage, the 90-piece orchestra we’d hired was turning up and Williams was at the podium getting set. He saw me come into the back of the stage, and came running through the orchestra and said something like, ‘Tom, I wonder if it would be OK if a friend sat in the control room with you.’ I said something like ‘sure, John, whomever you want’, and then asked who it was. Williams said: ‘Steven Spielberg’. He stayed through much of the morning session, and I remember sitting with him when we all heard The Mission theme for the first time.”

This is the cue from The Mission that NBC selected to open the Today Show and is the only John Williams cue that was still used on the show by the mid-90′s. It was used in conjunction with lighter themes that were used as bumpers, closes and secondary opens. At two brief but notable points in time, the Today Show tried to replace The Mission altogether: in 1994, to mark the debut of the street side studio, and in 2004. Currently they are using an updated version of this open that is longer and lighter.

When this theme debuted the Today Show started to climb up in the ratings, regularly beating GMA again for the first time since 1980. After the unfavorable publicity surrounding Jane Pauley’s replacement Deborah Norville hurt the show in 1990, knocking it down to second place, there was a resurgence in the mid-90′s. Bryant Gumbel and Katie Couric were the anchors and Jeff Zucker the legendary executive producer. Zucker eliminated all commercials from the first 22 minutes of the broadcast, turning that part into a serious newscast. He also started such morning show staples such as outdoor concerts and on-air weddings. It revived the Today Show and started a winning streak that would last over 15 years.

This theme, part IV of The Mission, was originally intended for special reports and only later was it adopted by Meet The Press as its main theme. It’s called the “Pulse of Events”. After the orchestra played it for the first time during the session to record it, the musicians liked the theme so much that they unexpectedly broke out in applause.

Meet the Press, having begun its radio run in 1945 and making its debut on television two years later, is the longest running show in the history of television. The original format consisted of a panel of journalists asking the guest questions, much like a press conference. When Tim Russert started his run as moderator, the format was changed. The panel was replaced with a single moderator who asked all the questions. To this day, with David Gregory as moderator, that is still the format used.

This is the third part of the four-part package that John Williams composed for NBC News. For the Today Show he composed the Scherzo for Today. In musical terms, scherzi are usually the third movement in four-movement works such as a symphony. They tend to be light, fast moving and upbeat. Although this theme starts out very different than the first part of The Mission (Nightly News’ theme), keep listening to hear some sampling of the first part in this music. Even though it was played multiple times a day on a daily basis, most viewers are not so familiar with the theme. That’s because it ran during the national weather scrolls that most local stations replace with their own local forecast. It was also used as a close. Scherzo for Today was phased out in 1990.

And here’s the music that was used for a number of years on the tomorrow on Today promo’s.

The program may have been forgotten, the theme certainly is not forgettable. This is Part II of The Mission by John Williams; originally titled as the “Fugue For Changing Times”. Before Hours was a 15-minute business news program that was a joint production of NBC News and the Wall Street Journal. It was anchored by Bob Jamieson, who was a frequent substitute news anchor on the Today Show, and the weather reports were provided by Joe Witte. The program was on the air from March 1987 to September 1988

In 1985 NBC wanted to do away with the synthesizer sounds forever and so they commissioned a full orchestral news theme package from famous movie-score composer John Williams, who’s credits include Star Wars, Jaws and Jurassic Park. The deal with John Williams to compose The Mission, as the NBC News theme is called, took 2 years to close. Williams was actually quite reluctant to take on this project because he found it so difficult. The reason? It would have to hold up for many plays a day for a long time (though two decades was on nobody’s mind). Up until that point, he found composing the five signature notes from Close Encounters his most difficult project. He and director Steven Spielberg had gone days back and forth on it. At one point, a frustrated Spielberg called a mathematician to ask how many combinations there would be for just a few notes. When the answer came back at around 35 million — clearly untestable — they went back into the creative process.

Eventually Williams did of course take on the project for NBC News. He was given free reign, only being asked to include opens, bumpers and closes. After a number of meetings with the NBC executive who was in charge of this project, Tom Wolzien, and the executive producers of Nightly News and Today (to get their visions on their programs), he set out to compose the music. NBC did not hear from him again until the day of the recording. After that session he delivered 19 cues to NBC, consisting of 4 closing themes, 4 opens and 11 bumpers. This is The Mission, part I and was used as the close for NBC Nightly News.

A more hard hitting cut of The Mission was chosen as the opening for Nightly News. It has been used as the open since 1985.

Here you can listen to a few rare bumpers from the original package that were used on various NBC News programs, including Nightly News. To record those, two long sessions were needed. Each cue went through many takes before Williams was happy with the result. The first bumper below is actually the 90th take of the session, while the second is take 108.

In 1976 NBC introduced the concept of red states and blue states. To graphically illustrate the election results, they colored a state red if a Democrat won and blue when a Republican did. ABC copied that four years later but switched the colors because red started with an ‘r’ for Republican. Other broadcasters would copy ABC’s color scheme but NBC kept their original color scheme for some time during the 1980′s. So on election night 1984, NBC’s map was almost entirely blue while ABC and CBS’ were almost entirely red. Regardless of the color of the graphics, Ronald Reagan was reelected with a landslide margin. For this election NBC commissioned a hybrid of their classic Salute to the President theme by Henry Mancini and their electronic open to Nightly News. In conjunction with this open, the original Mancini theme was still used as a close.

“You hear something that may be music or may be the sound Donald Duck would make if you held his head underwater a while,” that is how Linda Ellerbee, co-anchor of NBC News Overnight, described this theme once. NBC News Overnight premiered on July 5, 1982 with co-anchors Linda Ellerbee and Lloyd Dobyns. After six months, Bill Schechner replaced Dobyns. ‘Overnight’ was a one hour live overnight news show which pioneered the format of serious news mixed with features and irreverence–a format ABC’s World News Now later adopted. Though the program had many loyal fans, it was never a ratings success and cancelled after only seventeen months.

NBC Nightly News debuted in July of 1970 after Chet Huntley left the Huntley-Brinkley Report. David Brinkley anchored with John Chancellor and Frank McGee as part of an anchor trio that was not as successful as the Huntley-Brinkley pairing. A year later McGee left for Today and Brinkley was relegated to doing commentary. This left John Chancellor as solo anchor of Nightly News. However, he was never able to break Walter Cronkite’s grip on the American public. So Chancellor anchored Nightly News solo until April of 1982 when co-anchors Roger Mudd and Tom Brokaw took over. Brokaw went solo a little more than a year later. This open is a true classic. From 1979 to 1982 it was used as a bumper. Later it was used as the main open.

The next Ellis theme, a different arrangement of his “This is Today” theme, debuted during Bryant Gumbel’s first show on January 4, 1982, and was used until September 1985. This theme was so popular with viewers that it has been resurrected several times on the show — most notably in 1993-94 as the show’s secondary theme. Ever since then, it is used as the show’s unofficial anniversary music.

And here’s the open! For the first few years this music was used in combination with the Today sunburst but without an announcer. That changed in January 1984, when Fred Facey began his two-decade tenure as the voice of “Today.” From ’84 to ’85, Facey’s voice and this music were used with the “rotating globe” animation used by all NBC News shows at that time.

This bright and sunny piece called “This is Today” is perhaps one of the most popular themes used on the Today Show. It’s the second theme by Ray Ellis. It replaced the theme that Ellis composed earlier for the Today Show that was forced off the air by a lawsuit. This theme is closely associated with the late 1970′s era of Today with Tom Brokaw and Jane Pauley as anchors. It was phased out when Brokaw left the program at the end of 1981 but has been used in some anniversary segments over the years.

John Williams is not the first famous movie composer to do a news theme for NBC. This funky theme, used during the latter period of the John Chancellor era of Nightly News, is composed by Henry Mancini. He has done incredibly recognizable themes such as The Pink Panther. Aside from his work for Nightly News, Mancini also composed an election theme for NBC. While that one would stay on for decades, his theme for Nightly News only lasted 5 years.

NBC used this theme by Henry Mancini for a long time, from the election of Jimmy Carter as president to Bill Clinton. It has the patriotic title “Salute to the President”. Mancini is a well regarded composer, having composed instantly recognizable soundtracks to movies such as The Pink Panther. Here you can listen to the long close and an open.

Henry Mancini - Decision '76 open

Henry Mancini - Decision '76 close