John Williams is perhaps the most celebrated composer of movie music, with a vast range and a killer résumé that includes many of the best and most successful films of the last generation.

It's a mark of the esteem in which he's held that St. Louis Symphony Orchestra music director David Robertson will conduct next weekend's "SLSO Presents" concerts, "The Movie Music of John Williams."

"This is actually a program that I worked out with the composer himself," says Robertson, adding that it "contains much of the best-loved film music of all time, from 'The Cowboys' to 'Harry Potter.'"

It's impressive that a conductor best known for championing new music — including some fairly thorny stuff — is so keen on a composer like Williams.

"What I love about him is that he is an encyclopedia of music," Robertson says. "He knows almost every work by every composer.

"What that translates into is a perfect understanding of how humans are moved by music. I think this is his real gift: being able to figure out just what kinds of tones will move us."

With Williams' gift for both stand-alone themes ("Imperial March," anyone?) and more subtle background music, "the movie experience goes into emotional hyperdrive, in a way that it never would without his music," Robertson says.

These performances will give listeners the chance to hear the music performed live by a first-class orchestra.

"You occasionally get 'Star Wars' extravaganzas, but we have 'Star Wars' music, and we have music from 'Raiders of the Lost Ark,' 'Jaws,' 'ET,' 'Schindler's List,' on and on — plus the 'Olympic Fanfare,'" Robertson says. "It's really the kind of concert where you come out feeling like you're walking on air."