Ennio Morricone
Ennio Morricone is one of the most famous and most prolific movie composers of the 20th century. He has scored hundreds of films over past decades, very likely as many as 500. Although he has been scoring for every movie genre that exists and has been using every style imaginable, he is most associated with the ‘Spaghetti western’ movie genre, for which he developed a special style while producing scores for a movie director Sergio Leone.
Morricone’s opus is very much diverse, incorporating classical, pop, jazz, electronic, avangarde and Italian music styles, among others. Enrico Morricone is being considered by many as one of the most important and influential composers and music figures of modern times. The Early YearsMorricone was born on November 10th, 1928 in Rome, Italy. He has begun his music studies at Rome’s Conservatory of Santa Cecilia at the age of 12. He supported himself by playing a trumpet in jazz bands, then working for Italy’s national radio network after he graduated from the Conservatory.He started scoring movies not before early 60-ties, and he didn’t attract international attention until he began scoring for Leone in the mid 60-ties, starting with ‘A Fistful of Dollars’. Morricone had a previous experience on working on Italian Westerns with other movie directors. Interwiev with Ennio MorriconeIn this interwiev with Mixonline, Morricone shares his approach to writing, recording and taking his creation to the stage. To read it go here
Spaghetti Western, The Most KnownThe Spaghetti Westerns were only a small part of his rich career, but remained the most innovative and best part, according to many. He succeeded in amplifying the movie’s plot and drama by using diverse instrumentations and arrangements, such as Jew’s harps, piccolos, dissonant harmonicas, church organs, whistling, trumpets, ghostly vocal choruses, which all became trademarks of Morricone & Leone productions.There was also an influence of Rock & roll, felt in the low guitars. Morricone’s most famous theme, a composition for ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly’, covered by Hugo Montenegro, reached number 2 in US. Ennio Morricone was working on various other movies as well, such as ‘Battle of Algiers’ and ‘Burn’, and was working with numerous directors worldwide, keeping grand orchestrations and memorable motifs as trademarks of his work. Ennio Morricone was not slowed down by old age in the least. His commercial success and worldwide recognition reached its all-time peak in the 1980s, '90s, and 2000s. He was rewarded an Academy Award nomination in 1986 for ‘The Mission’. He continued his collaboration with great directors as Pedro Almodovar, Roman Polanski, Brian DePalma, Oliver Stone, Mike Nichols, and Barry Levinson. Considering the abundance of his recordings, collecting Morricone seems to be a daunting idea, as it is not likely that anyone would be able to collect all of his soundtracks. Even the composer himself doesn’t remember how many movies Ennio Morricone has worked on.
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