Todd Boekelheide (born June 27, 1954) is an American composer based in the

San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Go ...

, best known for his work

scoring Score or scorer may refer to: *Test score, the result of an exam or test Business * Score Digital, now part of Bauer Radio * Score Entertainment, a former American trading card design and manufacturing company * Score Media, a former Canadian m ...

documentary films. He won an

Academy Award The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...

for

Best Sound This is a list of categories of awards commonly awarded through organizations that bestow List of film awards, film awards, including those presented by various film, festivals, and people's awards. Best Actor/Best Actress *See Best Actor#Film awa ...

(''

Amadeus Amadeus may refer to: *Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791), prolific and influential composer of classical music *Amadeus (name), a given name and people with the name * ''Amadeus'' (play), 1979 stage play by Peter Shaffer * ''Amadeus'' (film), ...

'', 1984) and was nominated for another in the same category (''

Never Cry Wolf ''Never Cry Wolf'' is an account of the author's experience observing wolves in subarctic Canada by Farley Mowat, first published in 1963 by McClelland and Stewart. It was adapted into a film of the same name in 1983. It has been credited for dra ...

'', 1983).

Audio engineer

Boekelheide's film career began in 1974 at

American Zoetrope American Zoetrope (also known as Omni Zoetrope from 1977 to 1980 and Zoetrope Studios from 1980 until 1990) is a privately run American film production company, centered in San Francisco, California and founded by Francis Ford Coppola and Georg ...

Francis Ford Coppola Francis Ford Coppola (; ; born April 7, 1939) is an American film director, producer, and screenwriter. He is considered one of the major figures of the New Hollywood filmmaking movement of the 1960s and 1970s. Coppola is the recipient of five A ...

’s San Francisco production company. Beginning as a

projectionist A projectionist is a person who operates a movie projector, particularly as an employee of a movie theater. Projectionists are also known as "operators". Historical background N.B. The dates given in the subject headings are approximate. Early ...

, Boekelheide gradually acquired sound

post-production Post-production is part of the process of filmmaking, video production, audio production, and photography. Post-production includes all stages of production occurring after principal photography or recording individual program segments. The ...

skills, earning his first screen credit in 1976 as

re-recording mixer A re-recording mixer in North America, also known as a dubbing mixer in Europe, is a post-production audio engineer who mixes recorded dialogue, sound effects and music to create the final version of a soundtrack for a feature film, television pro ...

on Glen Pearcy’s film Fighting For Our Lives.

Early film career

In 1976, Boekelheide accepted an invitation to be an apprentice

film editor Film editing is both a creative and a technical part of the post-production process of filmmaking. The term is derived from the traditional process of working with film which increasingly involves the use of digital technology. The film edit ...

on a film in post-production in

Marin County Marin County is a county located in the northwestern part of the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 262,231. Its county seat and largest city is San Rafael. Marin County is acros ...

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

, which turned out to be ''

Star Wars ''Star Wars'' is an American epic film, epic space opera multimedia franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the Star Wars (film), eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide popular culture, pop-culture Cultural impact of S ...

'' (1977). Soon promoted to assistant editor, he found himself overseeing a wide variety of

optical effects Compositing is the process or technique of combining visual elements from separate sources into single images, often to create the illusion that all those elements are parts of the same scene. Live-action shooting for compositing is variously ca ...

, from

laser beams A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation. The word "laser" is an acronym for "light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation". The fir ...

and animal

chess Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to disti ...

pieces to lightsabers and optical scene transitions. His next film was

Carroll Ballard Carroll Ballard (born October 14, 1937) is a retired American film director. He has directed six feature films, including ''The Black Stallion (film), The Black Stallion'' (1979), ''Never Cry Wolf (film), Never Cry Wolf'' (1983), and ''Fly Away ...

’s ''

The Black Stallion The Black Stallion, known as the Black or Shêtân, is the title character from author Walter Farley's bestselling series about the Arab stallion and his young owner, Alec Ramsay. The series chronicles the story of a Sheikh's prized stallion a ...

'' (1979), where he started as an assistant film editor, then was promoted to associate film editor, working alongside

Robert Dalva Robert Dalva (born April 14, 1942, in New York City, USA) is a noted American film editor. Filmography as editor includes ''The Black Stallion (film), The Black Stallion'', ''Raising Cain'', ''Jumanji (film), Jumanji'', ''Jurassic Park III'' and ...

through the rough-cut stage of the film. From fine cut through to the end of the project he edited sound, and was responsible for fashioning temp music for the film for each public work-in-progress screening.

Composing for film

The temp music work ignited an interest in

film scoring A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film. The score comprises a number of orchestral, instrumental, or choral pieces called cues, which are timed to begin and end at specific points during the film in order to e ...

. Boekelheide began to explore this idea by furthering his music education at

Mills College Mills College at Northeastern University is a private college in Oakland, California and part of Northeastern University's global university system. Mills College was founded as the Young Ladies Seminary in 1852 in Benicia, California; it was ...

Oakland Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third largest city overall in the Bay A ...

. The Mills music department was known for its eclectic roots and broad-minded approach. Boekelheide studied

harmony In music, harmony is the process by which individual sounds are joined together or composed into whole units or compositions. Often, the term harmony refers to simultaneously occurring frequencies, pitches ( tones, notes), or chords. However ...

and

counterpoint In music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more musical lines (or voices) which are harmonically interdependent yet independent in rhythm and melodic contour. It has been most commonly identified in the European classical tradi ...

with Allaudin Matthieu, Indian raga singing with

Terry Riley Terrence Mitchell "Terry" Riley (born June 24, 1935) is an American composer and performing musician best known as a pioneer of the minimalist school of composition. Influenced by jazz and Indian classical music, his music became notable for it ...

, conducting with

David Rosenboom David Rosenboom (born 1947 in Fairfield, Iowa) is a composer-performer, interdisciplinary artist, author, and educator known for his work in American experimental music. Rosenboom has explored various forms of music, languages for improvisation, ...

, and became a member of

Lou Harrison Lou Silver Harrison (May 14, 1917 – February 2, 2003) was an American composer, music critic, music theorist, painter, and creator of unique musical instruments. Harrison initially wrote in a dissonant, ultramodernist style similar to his form ...

’s

Java Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's List ...

nese

gamelan Gamelan () ( jv, ꦒꦩꦼꦭꦤ꧀, su, ᮌᮙᮨᮜᮔ᮪, ban, ᬕᬫᭂᬮᬦ᭄) is the traditional ensemble music of the Javanese, Sundanese, and Balinese peoples of Indonesia, made up predominantly of percussive instruments. T ...

. After his time at Mills, Boekelheide was asked to score his first film, a short, ''End of Innocence: June 19, 1953'', directed by Stephen Stept. Carroll Ballard’s film ''

'' was next.

Mark Isham Mark Ware Isham (born September 7, 1951) is an American musician and film composer. A trumpeter and keyboardist, Isham works in a variety of genres, including jazz and electronic. He is also a film composer, having worked on numerous films and t ...

was asked to score the film, and Boekelheide produced the score and mixed the film, which earned him an Oscar nomination in 1984. The next year found him mixing the music on ''

'' (1984) which resulted in his winning an Oscar for Best Sound in 1985. Boekelheide went on to mix a number of high-profile films, notably for

Philip Kaufman Philip Kaufman (born October 23, 1936) is an American film director and screenwriter who has directed fifteen films over a career spanning more than six decades. He has been described as a "maverick" and an "iconoclast," notable for his versati ...

Peter Weir Peter Lindsay Weir ( ; born August 21, 1944) is a retired Australian film director. He's known for directing films crossing various genres over forty years with films such as '' Picnic at Hanging Rock'' (1975), ''Gallipoli'' (1981), ''Witness ...

Hector Babenco In Greek mythology, Hector (; grc, Ἕκτωρ, Hektōr, label=none, ) is a character in Homer's Iliad. He was a Trojan prince and the greatest warrior for Troy during the Trojan War. Hector led the Trojans and their allies in the defense o ...

Bob Rafelson Robert Jay Rafelson (February 21, 1933 – July 23, 2022) was an American film director, writer, and producer. He is regarded as one of the key figures in the founding of the New Hollywood movement of the 1970s. Among his best-known films as a ...

David Lynch David Keith Lynch (born January 20, 1946) is an American filmmaker, visual artist and actor. A recipient of an Academy Honorary Award in 2019, Lynch has received three Academy Award nominations for Best Director, and the César Award for Be ...

, and

David Fincher David Andrew Leo Fincher (born August 28, 1962) is an American film director. His films, mostly psychological thrillers and biographical dramas, have received 40 nominations at the Academy Awards, including three for him as Best Director. Fin ...

. For a time, Boekelheide was both scoring films and mixing films. But as the scoring work increased, the mixing work gradually tapered off, and his last job as a

was for

on ''

Panic Room ''Panic Room'' is a 2002 American thriller film directed by David Fincher. The film stars Jodie Foster and Kristen Stewart as a mother and daughter whose new home is invaded by burglars, played by Forest Whitaker, Jared Leto, and Dwight Yoaka ...

'' in 2002. As a film composer, Boekelheide came to be known for his scores for documentary films, and was awarded an Emmy for his score for ''Kids of Survival: The Life and Art of Tim Rollins and K.O.S.'' in 1999. Emmy nominations followed in 2007 for ''Boffo! Tinseltown's Bombs and Blockbusters'', and again in 2010 for ''Blessed is the Match''. Another Emmy nomination was announced in July 2017, for ''Symphony of the Soil''. Boekelheide is a member of both the

Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS, often pronounced ; also known as simply the Academy or the Motion Picture Academy) is a professional honorary organization with the stated goal of advancing the arts and sciences of motio ...

and the

Academy of Television Arts & Sciences The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS), also colloquially known as the Television Academy, is a professional honorary organization dedicated to the advancement of the television industry in the United States. It is a 501(c)(6) non-prof ...

, and since 2012 he has regularly served as an advisor for the Sundance Documentary Music and Sound Design Lab, currently held every year at

Skywalker Sound Skywalker Sound is the sound effects, sound editing, sound design, sound mixing and music recording division of Lucasfilm. Founded in 1975, the company's main facilities are located at George Lucas's Skywalker Ranch in Lucas Valley, near Nicasio, ...

Lucas Valley Lucas Valley is a valley in Marin County, California, drained to the east into San Pablo Bay by Miller Creek, as well as an unincorporated community in the valley, which forms part of the Lucas Valley-Marinwood CDP. Lucas Valley Road traverses ...

, near

Nicasio, California Nicasio ( ; Spanish for " Nicasius") is an unincorporated community and census-designated place in Marin County, California, United States. It is located west-southwest of Novato, at an elevation of . As of the 2020 census the CDP population w ...

. His scoring work continues, with recent credits including '' 3 1/2 Minutes, 10 Bullets'' for Marc Silver, and ''Saving Eden'' for

Bill Couturié William Couturié is a film director and producer, best known for his work in the field of documentary film. Accolades He won the 1989 Academy Award for the AIDS documentary '' Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt'' that he produced with Rob Ep ...

Selected filmography

*2015 '' 3 1/2 Minutes, 10 Bullets'' - Marc Silver *2011 ''Tokyo Waka'' - John Haptas and Kristine Samuelson *2006 ''Boffo! Tinseltown's Bombs and Blockbusters'' -

*2005 ''

Ballets Russes The Ballets Russes () was an itinerant ballet company begun in Paris that performed between 1909 and 1929 throughout Europe and on tours to North and South America. The company never performed in Russia, where the Revolution disrupted society. A ...

'' - Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller *2002 ''Señorita Extraviada/Missing Young Woman'' -

Lourdes Portillo Lourdes Portillo is a Mexican film director, producer, and writer. Biography Portillo got her first filmmaking experience at the age of twenty-one when a friend in Hollywood asked her to help out on a documentary. Her formal training began se ...

*1999 ''

Fight Club ''Fight Club'' is a 1999 American film directed by David Fincher and starring Brad Pitt, Edward Norton, and Helena Bonham Carter. It is based on the 1996 novel of the same name by Chuck Palahniuk. Norton plays the unnamed narrator, who is d ...

'' -

*1997 ''Kids of Survival: The Life and Art of Tim Rollins and K.O.S.'' - Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfine *1991 '' Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse'' - Fax Bahr,

George Hickenlooper George Loening Hickenlooper III (May 25, 1963 – October 29, 2010) was an American narrative and documentary filmmaker. Early life Hickenlooper was born in St. Louis, the son of Barbara Jo Wenger, a social worker and stage actress, and George L ...

, and

Eleanor Coppola Eleanor Jessie Coppola (''née'' Neil; born May 4, 1936) is an American documentary filmmaker, artist, and writer. She is married to director Francis Ford Coppola. She is most known for her 1991 documentary film '' Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmake ...

*1989 ‘’

The Salute of The Jugger ''The Salute of the Jugger'' (also released as ''The Blood of Heroes'' in the United States) is a 1989 Australian-American post-apocalyptic film written and directed by David Webb Peoples, produced by Charles Roven, and starring Rutger Hauer, Jo ...

’’ ‘’ Blood of Heroes’’

David Webb Peoples David Webb Peoples (born February 9, 1940) is an American screenwriter who wrote ''Blade Runner'' (1982), ''Unforgiven'' (1992), and ''12 Monkeys'' (1995). He was nominated for Oscar, Golden Globe, and BAFTA awards. He won the best screenplay ...

’’ *1988 ''Yosemite: The Fate of Heaven'' -

Jon H. Else Jon H. Else is an American documentary filmmaker and professor at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. He directs the documentary program. Biography Born in Worcester, Massachusetts, Else moved west for college. He earned a B.A. (Engli ...

*1987 '' Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam'' -

*1986 '' Blue Velvet'' -

*1984 ''

'' -

Miloš Forman Jan Tomáš "Miloš" Forman (; ; 18 February 1932 – 13 April 2018) was a Czech and American film director, screenwriter, actor, and professor who rose to fame in his native Czechoslovakia before emigrating to the United States in 1968. Forman ...

*1983 ''

'' -

*1979 ''

'' -

*1977 ''

'' -

George Lucas George Walton Lucas Jr. (born May 14, 1944) is an American filmmaker. Lucas is best known for creating the ''Star Wars'' and ''Indiana Jones'' franchises and founding Lucasfilm, LucasArts, Industrial Light & Magic and THX. He served as chairm ...

References

External links

*
ToboMusic.com
(Main Website) {{DEFAULTSORT:Boekelheide, Todd 1954 births Living people American audio engineers American film score composers Best Sound Mixing Academy Award winners