This afternoon on The Classical Network, we are North-bound, as we celebrate the anniversary of the birth of composer Alex North.
North was born in Chester, Pennsylvania (just outside of Philadelphia), on December 4th, 1910. His journey took him from a working class background to the Curtis Institute of Music, the Juilliard School, and the Moscow Conservatory. He also studied with Aaron Copland and Ernst Toch.
He became involved with the Federal Theatre Project. He worked in the ballet, especially with Martha Graham and Anna Sokolow. He accompanied the latter to Mexico, where he had an opportunity to study with Silvestre Revueltas. Perhaps not coincidentally, his three North American teachers, Copland, Toch, and Revueltas, had all worked in film.
North wrote his first film score as far back as the 1930s, around the time he met up with director Elia Kazan. North was drafted during the war, and put his talent to use writing music for the Office of War Information documentaries.
With the cessation of hostilities, he returned to the theater. He also composed some concert pieces. It was his theatre scores for plays like “A Streetcar Named Desire” that earned him an invitation to Hollywood, where he wrote the music for Kazan’s classic film adaptation. It was the first time jazz would be fully integrated into an onscreen drama, as opposed to merely play in the background of a given scene. Its success opened the door to a new “film score” sensibility, paving the way for composers like Elmer Bernstein, Henry Mancini, and his beloved Duke Ellington.
In all, North wrote 50 film scores, racking up 15 Academy Award nominations, yet never taking home the prize. In 1986, he received lifetime achievement recognition from the Academy, the first composer to be so honored.
There were times, during the course of his career, when his music took on an independent life, distinct from the films for which it was written. He scored major hits with “Unchained Melody” (originally written for the film “Unchained” and recorded some 500 times), and the love theme from “Spartacus.” The original soundtrack to “A Streetcar Named Desire” also sold extremely well.
His acclaimed contribution to “Spartacus” didn’t keep the film’s director, Stanley Kubrick, from rejecting North’s score for “2001: A Space Odyssey” – without telling him. (North found out only at the film’s premiere.) But director John Huston was very happy to have him. Later in his career, North became Huston’s composer of choice, for films like “The Misfits,” “Under the Volcano,” “Prizzi’s Honor,” and “The Dead.”
This afternoon, we’ll enjoy North’s rarely-heard Concerto for Piano and Orchestra with Trumpet Obbligato, and yes, selections from “Spartacus,” among our featured works, as we’ll also observe the birthdays of André Campra and Sir Hamilton Harty. We’ll face true North, between 4 and 7 p.m. EST, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.
BETTER LATE THAN NEVER: North with his honorary Oscar
