James Newton Howard started out playing keyboards (as "Jim Howard") in a little known rock band called "Mama Lion". He played keyboards, piano or synth in other groups and as a session musician, while releasing a couple of solo albums of his music. He joined Elton John's group of backing musicians and went on tour with the legend. This experience led to him working with many great singers, and gaining experience in conducting and arranging. An early introduction to film music was playing keyboards for Jerry Goldsmith on "Twilight Zone: The Movie". It wasn't long before Howard was asked to compose film scores himself and he has never looked back. Howard has other connections in the film industry too including a brief marriage to actress Rosanna Arquette. His brother Arliss Howard became an actor, and James Newton Howard has scored at least one of his films.
Howard belongs to that small select group of composers who can also be called upon to create a suitable soundtrack for virtually any large budget Hollywood film. There has been a fair quantity of family or romantic comedies (many starring Julia Roberts) for him to score, like "Pretty Woman", "My Girl", "Three Men and a Lady", "One Fine Day" and "French Kiss", but enough material from other genres to keep things interesting. "Wyatt Earp" demonstrated his Western genre credentials with the sort of music pioneered by Aaron Copland. "Prince of Tides" for which he was rightly oscar-nominated, has a wistful, nostalgic main theme with plenty of strings. At other times the soundtrack hints at dark undertones without revealing too much of the background story. Indeed every score produced by Howard does everything that a director could ask for, plus a little bit more.
That dark side merely hinted at in "Prince of Tides" has been more to the fore in recent years, since Howard seems to have struck up a fruitful artistic partnership with the director M. Knight Shyalaman, producing some unique and disturbing story-telling and suspense-laden, psychological music. The latest movie from this partnership, "Signs", is the third in a trilogy of such suspense films. Perhaps it was his music to accompany the dark psyche of Michael Douglas in "Falling Down" which suggested his suitability to this director, and Howard has also created some deliciously dark material for "Devil's Advocate". In complete contrast, Howard has also scored a number of Disney animations of late, including "Dinosaur", "Atlantis: The Lost Empire" and "Treasure Planet".
The death earlier this year of Elmer Bernstein left a vacanacy on the board of ASCAP. James Newton Howard has now been elected to the board to fill that vacancy and represent the composer community joining the team led by lyricist Marilyn Bergman as president and chairman. If you go to see King Kong the movie, in addition to James Newton Howard's excellent score you will also briefly see Howard Shore conducting the orchestra when Kong is put on stage in New York, and the final piece of music you hear while he's on stage is the soundtrack from the original "King Kong" by Max Steiner.
|
- Flatliners
- Pretty Woman
- The Fugitive
- American Heart
- King Ralph
- Dave
- Junior - the song "Look What Love has Done" received an Oscar nomination
- My Girl
- Three Men and a Little Lady
- Outbreak
- Wyatt Earp - some of this reminds the listener of Aaron Copland's Appalachian Spring, but it's done very well indeed
- Prince of Tides - quietly heroic with a passionate love theme, Oscar nominated
- Spacejam
- French Kiss - look out for the track played by Toot Thielemans on the harmonica
- Waterworld - this also includes a snippet from Henry Mancini's Peter Gunn theme
- My Best Friend's Wedding - some tongue in cheek music for this romantic comedy, and lots of songs by Bacharach and others
- One Fine Day - formulaic romantic comedy and soundtrack, but winning Howard a joint oscar nomination with his collaborators Friedman and Rich for the song "For The First Time"
- The Devil's Advocate - a good opportunity for some dark Omen-like material, though like Witches of Eastwick it doesn't take itself too seriously
- The Postman
- Falling Down - some dark psychological music to accompany this finely balanced movie
- Runaway Bride - yet another romantic comedy featuring Julia Roberts
- Vertical Limit
- Dying Young
- Dinosaur - first Disney animation with more to follow
- The Sixth Sense - suitably dark at times
- Unbreakable - the second movie with Shyalaman
- Atlantis: The Lost Empire
- Signs - third film with Shyalaman
- Treasure Planet
- Hidalgo - integrating Western and Middle Eastern sounds
- The Village - the latest from the partnership with Shyalaman features haunting solos from violinist Hilary Hahn
- Batman Begins - with co-composer Hans Zimmer
- The Interpreter - largely suspense music with some moments of action, though cleverly integrating African music including drums and wooden flute
- King Kong - replacing Howard Shore on Peter Jackson's remake
- Freedomland
- Blood Diamond - lots of action music and more relaxed ethnic tracks
- Michael Clayton
- Water Horse: Legend Of The Deep
|
TOP
BACK
