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JERRY GOLDSMITH Born in California in 1929, Jerry Goldsmith, a film composer who was nominated for 17 Oscars for his scores, started out under the tutelege of another composer, Miklos Rosza, known for his award winning score for "Ben Hur." Goldsmith's one Oscar win was for "The Omen," the original with Gregory Peck and Lee Remick in 1976. The remake 30 years later used much of Goldsmith's 1976 score. Goldsmith created an ominous Gregorian chant to draw the viewer's attention and paint the mood, and that chant becomes frantic during the scenes of deaths surrounding the secretly-adopted child, who, unbeknownst to adoptive parents is the Antichrist. Goldsmith also uses a wonderful, loving motif to reflect the innocence of Remick's unknowing and doomed character. Another of Goldsmith's many popular scores is "Boys from Brazil,", also starring Gregory Peck, this time appearing as a Nazi doctor hiding in South American and planning to restore Adolf Hitler through his method of cloning. The score combines a memorable waltz motif, along with the contrasting military beat of a world that had gone mad in the late 1930s and '40s. My final Goldsmith score that is haunting is "The Sand Pebbles," starring Steve McQueen, Candice Bergen, and Richard Crenna. Here Goldsmith manages to capture the mood of the Orient as well as a wonderful love theme for McQueen and Bergen. Ominous music is the underlying theme, as the U.S. sailors aboard ship are enveloped by a 1926 rebellion in China. Goldsmith's score intensifies the hopelessness of impending doom. A bit of trivia, Goldsmith had five children, and his son Joel Goldsmith also became a composer for both television and film. Goldsmith died in 2004.
NINO ROTA Born in Italy in 1911, Nino Rota was long famous for film scores before his music for "The Godfather" became familiar to American movie goers He first had a long relationship with film director Federico Fellini, whose first widely accepted film, "La Doce Vita," was seen by million of Americans, who left the theater humming bits and pieces of Rota's score of a decadent modern Roma. He and Fellini continued the partnership of director and composer for many of Fellini's imports to America. Also before his musical contributions to Francis Ford Coppola's "Godfather" trilogy, Rota composed for another Italian film director. Franco Zeffirelli and his film version of Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet." and the haunting melody of "A Time for Us" became popular as a widely accepted single, recorded by many vocal artists of the time in the late 1960s. His thematic music for the Zeffirelli film, the first to use actors close to the ages of Romeo and Juliet, caught the emotions of the star-crossed lovers and the tension of the feuding Montagues and Capulets. The soundtrack of the film became a best seller. Then Rota wrote the film music for "The Godfather," which was nominated for an Oscar. Ironically, the score for the first of Coppola's efforts did not win the Academy Award because while the score was at first nominated, the nomination was withdrawn because it was said that Rota had borrowed from an ealier film score of his. We say ironic, as Rota's score for the second in the series, 1974's "The Godfather Part II" did earn the Italian composer the Oscar, which he shared with Carmine Coppola. Go figure that one out! Rota died five years later in 1979 in Italy
DIMITRI TIOMPKIN A native of Russia, born in 1894 in the Ukraine, Tiomkin came to the United States and was a comtemporary of George Gerswhin. He was brought to Hollywood and was soon hired by many studios for his film scores. My favorite Tiomkin film score is "Lost Horizons." Adapted from James Hilton's novel of the 1930s, the story is a mythical tale of a perfect world, called Shangri La hidden in the Himalayas. Tiomkin's score first captures the chaos of the turbulent world that reflects what was happening in the 1930s, and then the peaceful sounds of a perfect society hidden in a sheltered mountain valley time forgot. He introduces the Shangri La motif with a bit of Oriental dissonance, plus, later, the love theme between the main character and the woman he soon loves in this new world. Also, the theme of Shangri La's high lama is interwoven. At the conclusion of the film, the composer mixes both the love theme and the lama motif to a crescendo climax. My second favorite Tiomkin score is "Duel in the Sun." starring Gregory Peck and Jennifer Jones. Here, the composer uses his harsh brass to bring out the roughness of the untamed West. The final theme is dramatic bordering on bombastic, as the two love-hate-lovers both mortally wound each other. My third choice of Tiomkin's scores is for the film "Giant.", with Rock Hudson, Elizabeth Taylor and James Dean. Using Edna Ferber's highly popular novel of the rough shod growth of Texas, Tiomkin uses his usual brasses to illustrate the vulgarity of sudden wealth, while using violins to depict the delicacy of the East Coast genteel bride who soon travels to a different world in the state of Texas, and who blends in, but manages to place her own brand on a brash brood of Texans. None of the above won any of Tiomkin's Academy Awards. Those were reserved for "High Noon" and "The High and the Mighty." Tiomkin died in London, England in 1974. |
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