The Composer in Hollywood

Title: The Composer In Hollywood

Author: Christopher Palmer

Format: Hardback

Publisher: Marion Boyars, ISBN: 0714528854, Year: 1990

Who were the Hollywood composers -those shadowy but indispensable figures who provided the musical background for so many great moments in the American cinema? Was it the lure of money or the desire to perfect their musical craft that made them carve out a career in films? Very often there was a little of both in the larger-than-life theatrical flair of Dimitri , Tiomkin, or the more classically-oriented styles and skills shown in the work of Miklos Rozsa and Bernard Herrmann. Hollywood was to be the refuge of much musical talent from abroad: emigres like Franz Waxman, Max Steinenand Erich Wolfgang Korngold brought the musical traditions of the conservatory, the cabaret and the light opera stage to the writing of film music.

Christopher Palmer discusses eleven composers' life and work during the era of the Hollywood greats (Steiner, Korngold, Newman, Waxman, Tiomkin, Webb, Rozsa, Herrmann, North, Bernstein and Rosen-man) and analyzes the scores of many well-known or remarkable films almost scene by scene. Each chapter is written in very clear non-technical language which will be of interest to the general reader as well as to the music and film enthusiast.

Christopher Palmer has combined the career of music writer and broadcaster with that of orchestral arranger specializing in film work. He has worked with some of the great figures of Hollywood music. A contributor regularly to The Musical Times, Gramophone, Music and Musicians and the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, he has published books on Arthur Bliss, Szymanowski, Rozsa and Benjamin Britten.