Soundtrack Maestros

Introduction by the Blog Author

After World War II, pop music changed substantially.  Big Band music never really returned to live tours, due to the expense of taking so many musicians out on the road and due to competition from the crisp sound from new FM radio.  Instrumental arrangers and conductors like Percy Faith, Henry Mancini, Hugo Montenegro, Nelson Riddle, Lex Baxter, Montovani and many others were heard on the radio and recording albums in the new, long-playing 33rpm format.

The AM radio arena became the medium of choice for rock and roll and for talk radio.  But as music progressed into the 1960s, the cost of getting a full orchestra together for recording sessions skyrocketed.  There were fewer and fewer instrumental hits.  Who could afford to assemble a full orchestra?

The answer was supplied by motion picture budgets.  The motion picture audience still wanted lush, new melodic lines for the pictures they went to see.  As motion pictures were released, the soundtrack album became part of the overall scene by plan and promotion, a trend that started with the hypnotic main theme for the movie Spellbound in 1945.  The composer/conductor/arranger became the standard.  After the death of Victor Young and retirement of Max Steiner in the 1950s, the artists in the list below took over and have provided millions of listeners with continued instrumental music, some of which is so infectious and hypnotic that modern classical orchestras, sometimes reluctantly!, have turned to it to increase ticket sales for their live performances.

 

Very Significant Modern Soundtrack Composers

 

John Barry

Jerry Goldsmith

Henry  Mancini

Alan Silvestri

Lalo Shifirin

Ennio Morricone

Stanley Tarrentine

Hans Zimmer

James Horner

John Powell

Danny Elfman

Michael Giacchino

Harry Gregson-Williams

Paul Desmond

David Arnold

Ande Desplat

Peter Kater

Angelo Badalamenti

Thomas Newman

Ramin Djawadi