Film scores can add so much to the tone and the pace of a movie, often they are instrumental in adding tension or showing the beauty in a shot that, without a melody would be overlooked. Basil Poledouris understood this well, now at age 61 his song has come to an end. The folks over at yahoonews.com give us this:
Emmy-winning composer Basil Poledouris, best known for his powerful music for action-adventure films of the 1980s and ’90s, died of cancer in Los Angeles on Wednesday, a spokeswoman said. He was 61.
Poledouris worked on the scores for the early Arnold Schwarzenegger vehicles “Conan the Barbarian” (1982) and “Conan the Destroyer” (1984), and his orchestral-and-choral compositions came to be considered high points in the genre of music for fantasy films.
His other feature credits included “The Blue Lagoon” (1980), “Robocop” (1987), “The Hunt for Red October” (1990), and “Free Willy” (1993). He won an Emmy in 1989 for his folk-based Western score for the miniseries “Lonesome Dove.”
The Kansas City, Mo., native is survived by his mother and two daughters. No services are planned.
Film is one of the few types of art that calls for many artists to come together and work in harmony. I love that, because often times art is very isolating. Film composers get to work with many people, thus touching many lives.
Basil Poledouris’s music will be missed in films, but I am sure his presence will be by those who knew him even more.
