Elmer Bernstein, 1922-2004: Oscar-winning composer of classic scores

By Claudia Luther
Los Angeles Times

LUCY NICHOLSON / THE AP Elmer Bernstein was nominated 14 times for Oscars and won one for "Thoroughly Modern Millie."

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Elmer Bernstein, the Academy Award-winning composer who died Wednesday at 82 after a lengthy illness, created some of the most recognizable music in American films.

"He was the consummate composer. He was classically trained and could do it all," said Marilyn Bergman, president of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP).

Mr. Bernstein, whose career spanned more than 50 years and more than 200 films, was nominated for Oscars 14 times, winning in 1967 for "Thoroughly Modern Millie." Among other nominated scores were "To Kill A Mockingbird," "The Magnificent Seven," "The Man With the Golden Arm," "True Grit," "The Age of Innocence" and, most recently, "Far From Heaven."

He also wrote for television, including "The Big Valley" in the 1960s and "Owen Marshall, Counselor at Law" in the 1970s, as well as many miniseries and TV documentaries. In 1963, he won an Emmy for "The Making of the President: 1960."

Bergman, the ASCAP president, said Wednesday that Mr. Bernstein "was among a group of composers who stood in the pantheon of film composing." His scores for "The Man With the Golden Arm" and "The Magnificent Seven" are classics, she said, and his credit sequence work for "Mockingbird" "stands as one of the best main titles, visually and musically."

Bergman, a songwriter, said Mr. Bernstein composed much of his work in the 1960s, '70s and '80s, when scores were written to complement a specific film, and not with an eye to album sales outside the theater.

Oscar nominations Elmer Bernstein won the 1967 Academy Award for his musical score for "Thoroughly Modern Millie" Nominations for films: 1956: "The Man with the Golden Arm" 1961: "The Magnificent Seven" 1962: "Summer and Smoke" 1963: "To Kill a Mockingbird" 1967: "The Return of the Seven" 1967: "Hawaii" 1984: "Trading Places" 1994: "The Age of Innocence" 2003: "Far From Heaven" Nominations for songs: 1963: "Walk on the Wild Side" from "Walk on the Wild Side" 1967: "My Wishing Doll" from "Hawaii" 1970: "True Grit" from "True Grit" 1975: "Wherever Love Takes Me" from "Gold"

"The art of really scoring a film dramatically, where the composer is almost an extension of the screenplay — that's very rare today, and it makes it all the sadder," Bergman said.

Lukas Kendall, publisher of the Film Score Monthly magazine, told The Hartford Courant last year that each time Mr. Bernstein got typecast, he transcended it.

"First he was the jazz composer, then he became the Western composer, which took him almost into the mid-'70s," Kendall said.

In the 1970s, Mr. Bernstein gave his career another dimension when he scored such comedies as "National Lampoon's Animal House," "Airplane!" "Stripes," "Meatballs" and "Ghostbusters."

He also created lyrical scores for "My Left Foot," "The Birdman of Alcatraz," "Rambling Rose" and other movies.

More recently, his 2002 score for "Far From Heaven" garnered praise for its lush, swooning quality that added a 1950s sensibility to the period movie directed by Todd Haynes and starring Julianne Moore and Dennis Quaid.

Mr. Bernstein was valued in the industry for his youthful optimism and energy. At age 79, still with no plans to retire, he told the Los Angeles Times:

"I can't think of anything else that I'd have rather done with my life. I think I made a difference. It is an amazing human privilege to look back at your life and simply be able to say that you had some part in making millions and millions of people feel better, two hours at a time."

Mr. Bernstein is survived by his wife, Eve; sons Peter and Gregory; daughters Emilie and Elizabeth; and five grandchildren.

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company

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