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Bernard Herrmann (June 29, 1911 – December 24, 1975) is generally regarded today as one of the greatest of all film composers. Although Hermann is particularly known for the scores he created for Alfred Hitchcock's films, he also composed notable scores for many other movies, including Citizen Kane, Cape Fear and Taxi Driver. As well, he composed music for the original sensational radio broadcast of Orson Welles' The War of the Worlds, several fantasy films by Ray Harryhausen, and a number of TV programs.

Early life and career

Herrmann was born in New York City. His father encouraged musical activity, taking him to the opera, and encouraging him to learn the violin. After winning a $100 composition prize at the age of thirteen, he decided to concentrate on music, and went to New York University where he studied with Percy Grainger. He also studied at the Juilliard School and, at the age of twenty, formed his own orchestra, The New Chamber Orchestra of New York.

In 1934, he joined the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) as a staff conductor. Within nine years, he had become Chief Conductor to the CBS Symphony Orchestra. He was responsible for introducing more new works to American audiences than any other conductor — he was a particular champion of Charles Ives' music, which was virtually unknown at that time.

While at CBS, he met Orson Welles, and wrote scores for his Mercury Theatre broadcasts including the famous adaptation of H. G. Wells' The War of the Worlds. When Welles moved to movies, Herrmann went with him, writing the scores for Citizen Kane (1941) and The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), although the score for the latter, like the film itself, was heavily edited by the studio. Because of this editing, which Herrmann believed to be inferior to his final score, he successfully lobbied to have his name removed from the credits. Between those two movies, he wrote the score for William Dieterle's The Devil and Daniel Webster (1941), for which he won his only Oscar.

Collaboration with Alfred Hitchcock

Herrmann is most closely associated with the director Alfred Hitchcock. He wrote the scores for every Hitchcock film from The Trouble with Harry (1955) to Marnie (1964), a period which included Vertigo and North by Northwest. He oversaw the sound design in The Birds (1963), although there was no actual music in the film as such, just electronically created bird sounds.

The music for the remake of The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956) was only partly by Herrmann. The two most significant pieces of music in the film—the song, "Que Sera Sera", and the cantata played in the Royal Albert Hall—are not by Herrmann at all (although he did re-orchestrate the cantata, which was principally the work of the Australian-born composer Arthur Benjamin). However, this film did give Herrmann an acting role: he is the orchestral conductor in the Albert Hall scene.

Herrmann's most recognizable music is from another Hitchcock film, Psycho. Unusually for a thriller, the score uses only the string section of the orchestra, no brass or percussion. The screeching violin music heard during the famous shower scene (which Hitchcock originally suggested have no music at all) is one of the most famous moments from all film scores.

His score for Vertigo is seen as just as masterful. In many of the key scenes Hitchcock let Herrmann's score take center stage, a score whose melodies, echoing Richard Wagner's Liebestod from Tristan und Isolde, dramatically convey the main character's obsessive love for the woman he tries to shape into a long dead love.

A notable feature of the Vertigo score is the ominous two-note falling motif that opens the suite — it is a direct musical imitation of the two notes sounded by the fog horns located at either side of the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco (as heard from the San Francisco side of the bridge). This motif has direct relevance to the film, since the horns can be clearly heard sounding in just this manner at Fort Point, the spot where the character played by Kim Novak jumps into the bay.

Herrmann's relationship with Hitchcock came to an end when they disagreed over the score for Torn Curtain. While Hitchcock wanted a score that was more jazz and pop influenced, Herrmann disagreed and produced an orchestral score. Herrmann subsequently moved to England, and was hired by François Truffaut to write the score for Fahrenheit 451.

Other works

From the late 1950s to the mid-1970s, Herrmann scored a series of notable mythically-themed fantasy films, including Journey to the Center of the Earth and The Three Worlds of Gulliver, and the Ray Harryhausen Dynamation epics Jason & the Argonauts, Mysterious Island, and The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad .

During the same period, Herrmann turned his talents to writing scores for television shows. Perhaps most notably, he wrote the scores for several well-known episodes of the original Twilight Zone series, including the lesser known theme used during the series' first season, as well as the theme to Have Gun—Will Travel.

In the mid-1960s he composed the highly-regarded music score for the François Truffaut film adaptation of Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. Scored for strings, two harps, vibraphone, xylophone and glockenspiel, Herrmann's score created a driving, neurotic mood that perfectly suited the film; it also had a direct influence on George Martin's string arrangement for McCartney's landmark 1966 Beatles single "Eleanor Rigby''.

Herrmann's last film scores included Sisters and Obsession for Brian De Palma. His final film soundtrack, and the last work he completed before his death, was his sombre score for the 1975 film Taxi Driver, directed by Martin Scorsese. Bernard Hermann died from cardiovascular disease in his sleep at his hotel in Los Angeles, California, the night he completed the final recording session for Taxi Driver. Scorsese dedicated the film to his memory.

As well as his many film scores, Herrmann wrote concert pieces, including a symphony (1941); an opera, Wuthering Heights; and a cantata, Moby Dick (1938).

Use of electronic instruments

His involvement with electronic musical instruments dates back to 1948, when he wrote "Jennie's Theme" for the David O. Selznick production Portrait of Jennie. This score was based on themes by Debussy, and utilized the theremin, which he used again for one of his most interesting scores, The Day the Earth Stood Still. Robert B. Sexton has noted that this score involved the use of treble and bass theremins (played by Dr. Samuel J. Hoffman and Paul Shure), electric violin, bass and guitar together with various pianos and harps, brass and percussion, and that Herrmann treated the theremins as a truly orchestral section.

Compositional style and philosophy

Herrmann's music is typified by frequent use of ostinati (short repeating patterns), novel orchestration and, in his film scores, an ability to portray character traits not altogether obvious from other elements of the film.

In the last years of Herrmann's life he did much to create interest in film scores as a form of music worthy of appreciation and performance. He subscribed to the belief since held by many that movie music can stand on its own legs when detached from the film for which it was originally written. To this end he made several well-known recordings for Decca of arrangements of his own film music as well as music of other prominent composers.

Legacy and recording

Herrmann is still a prominent figure in the world of film music today, despite his passing 30 years ago. As such, his career has been studied extensively by biographers and documentarians. In 1992 a documentary, Music for the Movies: Bernard Herrmann, was made about him. Also in 1992 a 2-1/2 hour long National Public Radio documentary was produced on his life "Bernard Herrmann: A Celebration of his Life and Music" (Bruce Crawford). In 1991, Steven C. Smith wrote a Herrmann biography entitled A Heart at Fire's Center, a quote from a favorite Stephen Spender poem of Herrmann's.

His music continues to be used in films and recordings after his death. His score for the 1968 film Twisted Nerve features in Quentin Tarantino's movie Kill Bill (2003). On their 1977 album Ra, American progressive rock group Utopia performed an electronic version of Hermann's "Overture: Mountaintop And Sunrise" (from Journey to the Centre of the Earth) as the introduction to the album's opening song, "Communion With The Sun".

Herrmann is well represented on disc. His close friend and colleague, John Steven Lasher, has produced several albums featuring uxtext recordings, including Battle of Neretva, Citizen Kane, The Kentuckian, The Magnificent Ambersons, Night Digger and Sisters, under those labels owned by Fifth Continent Australia Pty Ltd.

Hermann was also a champion of the romantic-era composer Joachim Raff, whose music had fallen into near-oblivion during the 1960s. In 1965, Herrmann conducted a recording of Raff's Fifth Symphony, 'Lenore.' The recording did not attract much notice in its time, but is now considered a major turning-point in the rehabilitation of Raff as a composer.

In 1996, Sony Classical released a recording of Herrmann's music, The Film Scores, performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic under the baton of Esa-Pekka Salonen. This disc received the 1998 Cannes Classical Music Award for "Best 20th-Century Orchestral Recording." It was also nominated for the 1998 Grammy Award for "Best Engineered Album, Classical." In 2004 Sony Classical re-released this superb recording at a budget price in its "Great Performances" series (SNYC 92767SK).

Fellow composer Danny Elfman considers Herrmann to be one of his major inspirations; Elfman adapted Herrmann's music for Psycho for use in director Gus Van Sant's 1998 remake.

Film scores (complete)

Note: Scores are dated by date of release, not by composition

Concert works

Excluding Juvenilia

External links

Deaths from cardiovascular disease | Film score composers | Jewish classical musicians | Jewish composers and songwriters | People who died in hotel rooms | 1911 births | 1975 deaths

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