No./19 Farewell to the Maestro
[IN MEMORIAM]
Two Hollywood composers pay tribute to Ennio Morricone, the all-time musical great behind Sergio Leone’s spaghetti Westerns (and so much more)
“I FEEL LIKE I’ve always been aware of his work, as long as I’ve been aware of films, going back to the early ’60s. I was interested in Italian cinema — Fellini, [Italian film score composer] Nino Rota. And so, of course, Morricone. He was the most innovative composer for film. Anybody that was interested in music or film was well aware of his great work. His unique approach to using sounds: using the recording studio, using orchestras, and odd instrumentation. He was an inspiration to many composers, all over the world, as well as listeners.
“One of his biggest influences [on me] was the fact that he orchestrated all his scores himself. He did everything by his own hand. In pencil. And I took that up. The scores for films such as The Lord Of The Rings are all orchestrated by one hand, in pencil. That idea was a big influence on me: to have this kind of control over every note that’s on the page. It’s something that I still do to this day. When I’m composing I’m kind of back in the 19th century, working with pencil and paper. But when I’m working on films, I use all of the very latest technology in the recording studio. I kind of mix 19th-century culture with 21st-century innovation.
“That mix was something Morricone could do: he was interested in music, he was interested
in composition, he was interested in the recording studio. These are things that I think inspired him. I recommend his book [a series of in-depth conversations between Morricone and protégé Alessandro De Rosa], In His Own Words, if you’re interested in learning more about him. The book is incredible; it’s so complex.
“He was so prolific. I think his legacy will carry on as one of the great artists of world cinema. He was The Maestro. We’ll miss him dearly.”