David Raksin (August 4, 1912 – August 9, 2004) was an American composer who was noted for his work in film and television. Raksin had more than 100 film scores and 300 television scores to his credit. Some sources called him the "Grandfather of Film Music".

Biography

David Raksin was born in

Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania, officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a U.S. state, state spanning the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern United States, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes region, Great Lakes regions o ...

, United States, to Jewish parents (of Russian heritage). His father was an orchestra conductor. Raksin played professionally in dance bands while attending Central High School of Philadelphia. He went on to study composition with Harl McDonald at the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (Penn or UPenn) is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. One of nine colonial colleges, it was chartered in 1755 through the efforts of f ...

, and later with Isadore Freed in New York and

Arnold Schoenberg Arnold Schoenberg or Schönberg (13 September 187413 July 1951) was an Austrian and American composer, music theorist, teacher and writer. He was among the first Modernism (music), modernists who transformed the practice of harmony in 20th-centu ...

in Los Angeles. In New York, Raksin worked as an arranger for Harms/Chappell. One of his earliest film assignments was as assistant to

Charlie Chaplin Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin (16 April 188925 December 1977) was an English comic actor, filmmaker, and composer who rose to fame in the era of silent film. He became a worldwide icon through his screen persona, the Tramp, and is considered o ...

in the composition of the score for '' Modern Times'' (1936). He is perhaps best remembered for his score for '' Laura'' (1944). The theme music for " Laura", with lyrics by

Johnny Mercer John Herndon Mercer (November 18, 1909 – June 25, 1976) was an American lyricist, songwriter, and singer, as well as a record label executive who co-founded Capitol Records with music industry businessmen Buddy DeSylva and Wallichs Music Cit ...

, became a major hit. During Raksin's lifetime, "Laura" was reportedly the second most-recorded song in history after " Stardust" by

Hoagy Carmichael Hoagland Howard "Hoagy" Carmichael (November 22, 1899 – December 27, 1981) was an American musician, composer, songwriter, actor, author and lawyer. Carmichael was one of the most successful Tin Pan Alley songwriters of the 1930s and 1940s, a ...

and Mitchell Parish. Raksin's theme song, "The Bad and the Beautiful" (also called "Love is For the Very Young") for the 1953 film '' The Bad and the Beautiful'' (1953) was also a hit, although not as popular as "Laura". Raksin insisted that the song be released as an instrumental, because he had resented having to split the proceeds from "Laura" with a lyricist. Raksin's theme for "The Bad and the Beautiful" was initially disliked by the film's director

Vincente Minnelli Vincente Minnelli (; born Lester Anthony Minnelli; February 28, 1903 – July 25, 1986) was an American Theatre director, stage director and film director. From a career spanning over half a century, he is best known for his sophisticated innovat ...

and producer

John Houseman John Houseman (born Jacques Haussmann; September 22, 1902 – October 31, 1988) was a Romanians, Romanian-born British Americans, British-American theatre and film producer, actor, director, and teacher. He became known for his highly publ ...

, but was saved from rejection by the intervention of Adolph Green and Betty Comden, who both liked it. The theme has since been praised by

Stephen Sondheim Stephen Joshua Sondheim (; March22, 1930November26, 2021) was an American composer and lyricist. Regarded as one of the most important figures in 20th-century musical theater, he is credited with reinventing the American musical. He received Lis ...

, Leonard Rosenman, Richard Rodney Bennett, and Alexander Courage. Sondheim reportedly called it "one of the best themes ever written in films." Raksin also scored the 1958 film '' Separate Tables'', for which he earned an

Academy Award The Academy Awards, commonly known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit in film. They are presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) in the United States in recognition of excellence ...

nomination. In the 1960s, Raksin wrote the theme for (and scored the pilot of) the

medical drama A medical drama is a Television film, television movie or film in which events center upon a hospital, clinic, doctor's office, a paramedic, or any other medical topic or environment. Most recent medical drama (film and television), dramatic progra ...

television series ''

Ben Casey ''Ben Casey'' is an American medical drama television series that aired on ABC from 1961 to 1966. The show was known for its opening titles, which consisted of a hand drawing the symbols "♂, ♀, ✳, †, ∞" on a chalkboard, as cast member ...

''. Later in life, Raksin taught at the

University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in ...

and the

University of California, Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school the ...

. Raksin died in 2004, aged 92. At the time of his death, it was announced that Raksin had completed his autobiography, titled ''If I Say So Myself''. The book was eventually published under the title ''The Bad and the Beautiful: My Life in a Golden Age of Film Music''. In 2012, he was named for a Lifetime Achievement Award for a Past Film Composer. His son Alex is a

Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prizes () are 23 annual awards given by Columbia University in New York City for achievements in the United States in "journalism, arts and letters". They were established in 1917 by the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made his fo ...

-winning

editorial An editorial, or leading article (UK) or leader (UK), is an article or any other written document, often unsigned, written by the senior editorial people or publisher of a newspaper or magazine, that expresses the publication's opinion about ...

writer for the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...

''.Schott & Co. Ltd. recorder score RMS 850 (1957)

Select film and TV scores

*'' The Day After'' (1983) *'' The Ghost of Flight 401'' (1978) *'' Glass Houses'' (1972) *'' What's the Matter with Helen?'' (1971) *''

The Over-the-Hill Gang Rides Again ''The Over-the-Hill Gang Rides Again'' starring Walter Brennan and Fred Astaire is a 1970 '' ABC Movie of the Week'' sequel to the Western comedy '' The Over-the-Hill Gang''. The supporting cast includes Edgar Buchanan, Andy Devine, Chill Wi ...

'' (1970) *'' Will Penny'' (1968) *'' A Big Hand for the Little Lady'' (1966) *'' Love Has Many Faces'' (1965) *'' Sylvia'' (1965) *''

Invitation to a Gunfighter ''Invitation to a Gunfighter'' is a 1964 DeLuxe Color Western (genre), Western film directed by Richard Wilson (director), Richard Wilson, starring Yul Brynner and George Segal. It was based on a 1957 teleplay by Larry Klein that appeared on '' ...

'' (1964) *'' The Patsy'' (1964) *'' Two Weeks in Another Town'' (1962) *'' Too Late Blues'' (1961) *'' Night Tide'' (1961) *'' Pay or Die'' (1960) *''

Al Capone Alphonse Gabriel Capone ( ; ; January 17, 1899 – January 25, 1947), sometimes known by the nickname "Scarface", was an American organized crime, gangster and businessman who attained notoriety during the Prohibition era as the co-foun ...

'' (1959) *'' Separate Tables'' (1958) *'' Twilight for the Gods'' (1958) *'' Until They Sail'' (1957) *'' Gunsight Ridge'' (1957) *'' Man on Fire'' (1957) *'' The Vintage'' (1957) *'' Bigger Than Life'' (1956) *'' Hilda Crane'' (1956) *'' Jubal'' (1956) *'' Seven Wonders of the World'' (1955) (with Sol Kaplan, Jerome Moross, Emil Newman) *''

The Big Combo ''The Big Combo'' is a 1955 American crime film, crime film noir directed by Joseph H. Lewis, written by Philip Yordan and photographed by cinematographer John Alton, with music by David Raksin. The film stars Cornel Wilde, Richard Conte and Bria ...

'' (1955) *'' Suddenly'' (1954) *''

Apache The Apache ( ) are several Southern Athabaskan language-speaking peoples of the Southwestern United States, Southwest, the Southern Plains and Northern Mexico. They are linguistically related to the Navajo. They migrated from the Athabascan ho ...

'' (1954) *'' The Unicorn in the Garden'' (1953) *'' The Bad and the Beautiful'' (1952) *''Madeline'' (cartoon) (1952) *'' Carrie'' (1952) *''

Pat and Mike ''Pat and Mike'' is a 1952 American romantic comedy film starring Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn. The movie was written by Ruth Gordon and Garson Kanin, and directed by George Cukor. Cukor directed ''The Philadelphia Story (film), The Phil ...

'' (1952) *''

The Man with a Cloak ''The Man with a Cloak'' is a 1951 American film noir crime- thriller-drama directed by Fletcher Markle and starring Joseph Cotten, Barbara Stanwyck, Louis Calhern, and Leslie Caron, and based on "The Gentleman from Paris", a short story by ...

'' (1951) *'' Across the Wide Missouri'' (1951) *'' Kind Lady'' (1951) *'' The Next Voice You Hear...'' (1950) *'' The Magnificent Yankee'' (1950) *''

Whirlpool A whirlpool is a body of rotating water produced by opposing currents or a current running into an obstacle. Small whirlpools form when a bath or a sink is draining. More powerful ones formed in seas or oceans may be called maelstroms ( ). ''Vo ...

'' (1950) *'' Force of Evil'' (1948) *'' Apartment for Peggy'' (1948) *'' Fury at Furnace Creek'' (1948) *'' Daisy Kenyon'' (1947) *'' Forever Amber'' (1947) *'' The Secret Life of Walter Mitty'' (1947) *'' Smoky'' (1946) *''

Fallen Angel Fallen angels are angels who were expelled from Heaven. The literal term "fallen angel" does not appear in any Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic religious texts, but is used to describe angels cast out of heaven. Such angels are often described ...

'' (1945) *'' Laura'' (1944) *''

Tampico Tampico is a city and port in the southeastern part of the Mexican state of Tamaulipas. It is located on the north bank of the Pánuco River, about inland from the Gulf of Mexico, and directly north of the state of Veracruz. Tampico is the fif ...

'' (1944) *'' City Without Men'' (1943) *'' The Men in Her Life'' (1941) *'' The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes'' (1939) *'' Stanley and Livingstone'' (1939) *''

The Hound of the Baskervilles ''The Hound of the Baskervilles'' is the third of the four Detective fiction, crime novels by British writer Arthur Conan Doyle featuring the detective Sherlock Holmes. Originally serial (literature), serialised in ''The Strand Magazine'' from ...

'' (1939) *'' Modern Times'' (arranger) (1936)

Work on Broadway

*'' Thumbs Up!'' (1934) -

revue A revue is a type of multi-act popular theatre, theatrical entertainment that combines music, dance, and sketch comedy, sketches. The revue has its roots in 19th century popular entertainment and melodrama but grew into a substantial cultural pre ...

- co-orchestrator *''Parade'' (1935) -

- co-

orchestrator Orchestration is the study or practice of writing music for an orchestra (or, more loosely, for any musical ensemble, such as a concert band) or of adapting music composed for another medium for an orchestra. Also called "instrumentation", orch ...

*'' At Home Abroad'' (1935) -

- co-

*''New Faces of 1936'' (1936) -

- co-

*''If the Shoe Fits'' (1946) -

musical Musical is the adjective of music. Musical may also refer to: * Musical theatre, a performance art that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting and dance * Musical film Musical film is a film genre in which songs by the Character (arts), charac ...

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...

*''Dream'' (1997) -

- featured

songwriter A songwriter is a person who creates musical compositions or writes lyrics for songs, or both. The writer of the music for a song can be called a composer, although this term tends to be used mainly in the classical music genre and film scoring. ...

for " Laura"

References

External links

* *
Brief biography from Otherminds.org
''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' (August 11, 2004)

Interviews

Streaming audio interview with Raksin
by Charles Amirkhanian, January 28, 1988

by Bruce Duffie, May 1988 {{DEFAULTSORT:Raksin, David 1912 births 2004 deaths 20th-century American composers 20th-century American Jews 20th-century American male musicians American film score composers American male film score composers Jewish American film score composers American people of Russian descent American people of Russian-Jewish descent Musicians from Philadelphia Pupils of Arnold Schoenberg University of Pennsylvania alumni University of Southern California faculty University of California, Los Angeles faculty Central High School (Philadelphia) alumni 20th-century American songwriters

Biography

Select film and TV scores

Work on Broadway

See also

References

External links

Interviews