Hammer Studios could always bank on the antipodean artistry of Don Banks, born in Australia 100 years ago today.

Jazz was Banks’ first love, but he also studied classical composition with Mátyás Seiber and took lessons with total serialist Milton Babbitt. Unlikely as it may seem, both shared Banks enthusiasm for jazz. Another one of Banks’ tutors was Luigi Dallapiccola, also steeped in serialism. He found perhaps greater sympathy in his association and friendship with “third stream” master Gunther Schuller.

What really buttered Banks’ bread was his commercial music, with a primary source of income derived from writing scores for Hammer films, including those for “The Reptile,” “Rasputin the Mad Monk,” “The Evil of Frankenstein,” and “The Mummy’s Shroud.” In all, he scored 19 feature films, 22 documentaries, and more than 60 television shows. Nearly half of his film scores were for Hammer, where he could really let his hair down. In addition, he wrote music for cartoon shorts, advertisements, and animated television series.

In the 1970s, he returned to Australia, where he held several education and administrative posts.

Some of the scores he wrote for Hammer were jazz-inflected, including that for “Hysteria.”

Sending thanks to Banks on his centenary!

Jazzy “Hysteria”

“Captain Clegg” (a.k.a. “Night Creatures”)

“Confessions of a Psycho Cat”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L90pLrlqFSw

“The Mummy’s Shroud”

“Four Pieces for String Quartet”

“Blues for Two”

Examples of Banks’ “third stream” music (a synthesis of jazz and classical)