Alex North

Alex North (December 4, 1910 – September 8, 1991) was an American composer best known for his many film scores, including A Streetcar Named Desire (one of the first jazz-based film scores), Viva Zapata!, Spartacus, Cleopatra, and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?. He was the first composer to receive an Honorary Academy Award.

Early life

North was born Isadore Soifer in Chester, Pennsylvania to Russian Jewish parents.

Career

North managed to integrate his modernism into typical film music leitmotif structure, rich with themes. One of these became the famous song, "Unchained Melody". Nominated for fifteen Oscars but unsuccessful each time, North is one of only two film composers to receive the Lifetime Achievement Academy Award, the other being Ennio Morricone. North's frequent collaborator as orchestrator was the avant-garde composer Henry Brant. He won the 1968 Golden Globe award for his music to The Shoes of the Fisherman (1968).

His best-known film scores include A Streetcar Named Desire, Death of a Salesman, Viva Zapata!, The Rainmaker, Spartacus, The Misfits, Cleopatra, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Dragonslayer and Under the Volcano. His music for The Wonderful Country makes use of Mexican and American motifs.

Soundtrack

A soundtrack, also written sound track, can be recorded music accompanying and synchronized to the images of a motion picture, book, television program or video game; a commercially released soundtrack album of music as featured in the soundtrack of a film or TV show; or the physical area of a film that contains the synchronized recorded sound.

Origin of the term

In movie industry terminology usage, a sound track is an audio recording created or used in film production or post-production. Initially the dialogue, sound effects, and music in a film each has its own separate track (dialogue track, sound effects track, and music track), and these are mixed together to make what is called the composite track, which is heard in the film. A dubbing track is often later created when films are dubbed into another language. This is also known as a M & E track (music and effects) containing all sound elements minus dialogue which is then supplied by the foreign distributor in the native language of its territory.

Joseph L. Mankiewicz

Joseph Leo Mankiewicz (February 11, 1909 – February 5, 1993) was an American film director, screenwriter, and producer. Mankiewicz had a long Hollywood career, and twice won the Academy Award for both Best Director and Best Writing, Screenplay, for A Letter to Three Wives (1949) and All About Eve (1950).

Early life

Joseph Mankiewicz was born in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, to Franz Mankiewicz (died 1941) and Johanna Blumenau, Jewish immigrants from Germany. He had a sister, Erna Mankiewicz (1901–1979), and a brother, Herman J. Mankiewicz (1897–1953), who became a screenwriter. Herman also won an Oscar for co-writing Citizen Kane (1941).

At age four, Mankiewicz moved with his family to New York City where he graduated in 1924 from Stuyvesant High School. In 1928, he obtained a bachelor's degree from Columbia University. For a time he worked in Berlin, Germany, as a foreign correspondent for the Chicago Tribune newspaper before entering the motion picture business.

Hollywood career

Original (disambiguation)

Originality is the quality of novelty or newness in created works.

Original or The Originals may also refer to:

Books and publishing

Companies and Brands

Sports

Films and television

Music

Bands

The Original Soundtrack

The Original Soundtrack is the third studio album by the English art rock band 10cc. It was released in 1975 and peaked at number four on the UK Albums Chart. The Original Soundtrack includes the singles "Life Is a Minestrone" and "I'm Not in Love", the latter of which is the band's most popular song.

The album was recorded and produced by the band at Strawberry Studios in 1974 with Eric Stewart engineering and mixing. The album received good reviews when originally released on LP and cassette by Mercury Records in March 1975. The album has since been reissued on several occasions with bonus tracks and has been remastered. The artwork was designed by Hipgnosis and illustrated by artist Humphrey Ocean.

Background

The album was the first to be released by Mercury Records after signing the band for $1 million in February 1975. The catalyst for the deal was the fact the record executives had heard one song – "I'm Not in Love". Eric Stewart recalled:

The rest of the album, which was already complete, was released just weeks later.