Born: February 10th, 1929
Died: July 21st, 2004
Nationality: American
Style/Genre: Film music
Jerry Goldsmith grew up wanting to become a concert hall composer with him starting to learn the piano at the age of 6. At 14 years of age, he started to study the art of composition, theory and counterpoint with two other people: Jacob Gimpel and Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco. However, Goldsmith realised the infrequency of concert hall commission would not be able to satisfy his hunger for writing music. For this reason, Goldsmith looked into writing music for films.
Goldsmith’s first introduction to a musical career saw him as the clerk typist in 1950 for CBS, writing scores for numerous radio shows. His musical talent was noticed by Revue Studios who appointed Goldsmith to score the Thriller series. Goldsmith became more famous in the film music industry and saw him create the film score for large production films such as Star Trek, Rambo, Alien and Looney Tunes Back In Action which was the last film score he ever produced. Goldsmith was at the center of film music.
Goldsmith was influenced by movements from early 20th-century classical music such as Modernism, Americana, Impressionism and early film scores. His style consisted of a unique range of instruments chosen using a wide range of textures, recorded sounds along with the traditional orchestra that usually overlapped in duration.
