A frequent source for compilation cues and re-recordings, Goldsmith's work has been at the center of many third-party CD offerings since 1997. Varese Sarabande released a compilation album called "Frontiers," including the best of his sci-fi music, and several other labels followed with world-wide re-recordings in a similar fashion. Expanded re-releases of many of Goldsmith's best works have also graced record stores, including Patton, Tora! Tora! Tora!, Stagecoach, A Patch of Blue, Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Rio Conchos, The Swarm, and Poltergeist, and have spoiled film music fans with crisp-sounding, complete CD releases of his best works. At the same time, with the volume of work that Goldsmith has produced, many of his smaller efforts of the 1990's have completely gone out of print and disappeared from record stores, making life more difficult for collectors and Goldsmith "completists."
...In 1998, he was nominated for an Academy Award for his epic score for the animated film Mulan, his first and very successful teaming with Disney. At the same time, his fans have been delighted by his loyalty to his most famous franchise, scoring three Next Generation Star Trek films late into his career. The older generation of fans will insist, however, that Goldsmith's prime existed in from 1970 to 1990, with several of his most classic scores including Hoosiers, The Russia House, The Wind and the Lion, Patton, and Under Fire. Whatever comes next, whether it be action, romance, sci-fi, or westerns, Goldsmith is always ready to tackle a score with enthusiasm and creativity, and provide fans with endless moments of movie music magic.
IMDb has a mini-bio:
- Born February 1929, Jerry Goldsmith studied piano with Jacob Gimpel and composition, theory and counterpoint with Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco. He also attended classes in film composition given by 'Miklos Rozsa' at the Univeristy of Southern California. In 1950, he was employed as a clerk typist in the music department at CBS. Here he was given his first embryonic assignments as a composer for radio shows such as 'Romance' and 'CBS Radio Workshop'. He wrote one score a week for these shows which were performed live on transmission. He stayed with CBS until 1960, having already scored 'The Twilight Zone'. He was hired by Revue Studios to score their 'Thriller' series. It was here that he met the influential film composer Alfred Newman who hired Goldsmith to score the film 'Lonely Are The Brave' (1963), his first major feature film score. An experimentalist, Goldsmith is constantly pushing forward the bounds of film music: Planet of the Apes (1968) included horns blown without mouthpieces and a bass clarinetist fingering the notes but not blowing. He is unafraid to use the wide variety of electronic sounds and instruments which are now available, although he does not use them for their own sake.
Article comments
1 - Rodney Welch
That is SOME body of work! His Chinatown score is as moody and evocative as those by Max Steiner or Nernard Herrmann.
2 - Eric Olsen
yes, I was astonished to see how many movies he had scored - a true giant in the field