Alfred Newman



Newman in 1913

Born: March 17, 1900; New Haven, Connecticut, U.S.
Died: February 17, 1970 (aged 69); Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Resting place: Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale

Alfred Newman (March 17, 1900 – February 17, 1970) was an American composer, arranger, and conductor of film music. From his start as a music prodigy, he came to be regarded as a respected figure in the history of film music. He won nine Academy Awards and was nominated 45 times, contributing to the extended Newman family being the most Academy Award-nominated family, with a collective 92 nominations in various music categories.

In a career spanning more than four decades, Newman composed the scores for over 200 motion pictures. Some of his most famous scores include Wuthering Heights, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, The Mark of Zorro, How Green Was My Valley, The Song of Bernadette, Captain from Castile, All About Eve, Love is a Many Splendored Thing, Anastasia, The Diary of Anne Frank, How The West Was Won, The Greatest Story Ever Told, and his final score, Airport, all of which were nominated for or won Academy Awards. He is perhaps best known for composing the fanfare which accompanies the studio logo at the beginning of 20th Century Fox's productions. Prior to commencing his employment with 20th Century Fox, Newman composed the fanfares which are most often associated with Samuel Goldwyn productions and David O. Selznick productions.

Newman was also highly regarded as a conductor, and arranged and conducted many scores by other composers, including George Gershwin, Charlie Chaplin, and Irving Berlin. He also conducted the music for many film adaptations of Broadway musicals (having worked on Broadway for ten years before coming to Hollywood), as well as many original Hollywood musicals.

He was among the first musicians to compose and conduct original music during Hollywood's Golden Age of movies, later becoming a respected and powerful music director in the history of Hollywood. Newman and two of his fellow composers, Max Steiner and Dimitri Tiomkin, were considered the "three godfathers of film music"

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Newman family

He married Martha Louise Montgomery (born December 5, 1920, Clarksdale, Mississippi - died May 9, 2005, Pacific Palisades, California), a former actress and Goldwyn Girl; they had five children.

He was the head of a family of major Hollywood film composers:

• His brother Lionel Newman scored three dozen films and several TV series, adapting and conducting scores for hundreds of other films; he succeeded Alfred as Fox's music director.
• His brother Emil Newman was music director for over eighty films.
• His son David Newman has scored nearly one hundred films, including The War of the Roses, Hoffa, The Nutty Professor, Anastasia, Galaxy Quest, Ice Age, and Serenity, and has received an Academy Award nomination.
• His son Thomas Newman has scored over seventy-five films, including Little Women, The Shawshank Redemption, Unstrung Heroes, American Beauty, Road to Perdition, Finding Nemo, Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events, The Good German, WALL-E, Skyfall, Saving Mr. Banks and has received fifteen Academy Award nominations.
• His daughter Maria Newman is an eminent musician and composer.
• His nephew Randy Newman is a two-time Academy Award winner, noted not only for his film work but also for a series of popular albums as a singer/songwriter.
• His grandnephew Joey Newman has scored many TV series, films, and video games.
• His granddaughter Jaclyn Newman is a music editor, and won a Golden Reel Award for 30 Days of Night: Dark Days, and has received additional nominations for Burlesque and Nashville (2012 TV series).

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20th Century-Fox CinemaScope Opening with Composer Alfred Newman's First Use of the Extended Fanfare

Puppetoon
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14,166 views Jun 1, 2020
20th Century-Fox CinemaScope Opening (1954) from "River of No Return". Notable, as it was the very first Fox feature to introduce composer Alfred Newman's EXTENDED musical "Fanfare" for "A CinemaScope Production". CinemaScope was first introduced on the Fox feature "The Robe" (1953) but without the now memorable Newman signature fanfare music.

Alfred Newman - 20th Century Fox Fanfare - Stéphane Denève | Made in America

Concertgebouworkest
95.7K subscribers

16,584 views Jan 30, 2022
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra
Stéphane Denève - conductor

Alfred Newman - 20th Century Fox Fanfare

Recorded live on 27 January 2022 at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam.

Made in America
On 28, 29 and 30 January you can experience a whole weekend of music brimming with the energy and diversity of the United States on our website. Recordings of chamber music, iconic film music and symphonic works by composers including Ives, Adams, Wolfe, Higdon, Dvořák and Copland and three concerts streams from the Concertgebouw: https://www.concertgebouworkest.nl/en/stories/made-in-america-online

TheStockwell | 1 year ago

Trivia: the original fanfare ended at 0:13 When Widescreen/Cinemascope was introduced, Newman was asked to extend the fanfare into the one we are all now familiar with. Also, when digital and Dolby/THX recording was introduced, the fanfare was re-recorded . . . by John Williams.