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David Shire | |
|---|---|
 Shire inNew York City with pianist and composerAndrew Gerle and bassist Danny Weller on September 20, 2013. | |
| Born | David Lee Shire (1937-07-03)July 3, 1937 (age 88) Buffalo, New York, U.S. |
| Occupation | Composer |
| Years active | 1960s–present |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 2 |
| Musical career | |
| Genres | Film score musicals Television score |
| Instrument | Piano |
| Website | http://davidshiremusic.com/ |
Musical artist | |
David Lee Shire (born July 3, 1937) is an American songwriter and composer of stagemusicals, film and televisionscores.[1] Among his best known works are the motion picture soundtracks toThe Big Bus,The Taking of Pelham One Two Three,The Conversation,All the President's Men, and parts of theSaturday Night Fever soundtrack such as "Manhattan Skyline". His other work includes the score of the 1985 filmReturn to Oz (the "sequel-in-part" ofThe Wizard of Oz), and the stage musical scores ofBaby,Big,Closer Than Ever, andStarting Here, Starting Now. Shire is married to actressDidi Conn.
Shire was born inBuffalo, New York, to Esther Miriam (née Sheinberg) and Buffalo society band leader and piano teacher Irving Daniel Shire.[2] His family wasJewish. His secondary education was at theNichols School. He met his long-time theater collaborator lyricist/directorRichard Maltby Jr. atYale University, where they wrote two musicals,Cyrano andGrand Tour, which were produced by theYale Dramatic Association. Shire also co-fronted a jazz ensemble at Yale, the Shire-Fogg Quintet, and was aPhi Beta Kappa honors student, with a double major in English and music. He was a member of the Pundits andElihu and he graduatedmagna cum laude in 1959.
After a semester of graduate work atBrandeis University (where he was the firstEddie Fisher Fellow) and six months in theU.S. Army National Guardinfantry, Shire took up residence in New York City, working as a dance class pianist, theater rehearsal and pit pianist, and society band musician while constantly working with Maltby on musicals. Their firstoff-Broadway show,The Sap of Life, was produced in 1961 at One Sheridan Square Theater inGreenwich Village. He co-wroteThe Village Stompers' "Washington Square" withBob Goldstein in 1963.
Shire began scoring for television in the 1960s and made the leap to scoringfeature films in the early 1970s. He was then married to actressTalia Shire, for whose brotherFrancis Ford Coppola he scoredThe Conversation, perhaps his best known score, in 1974. Additional screen credits includeTwo People,The Taking of Pelham One Two Three,The Hindenburg,Farewell, My Lovely,All The President's Men,The Big Bus,2010,Return to Oz,Short Circuit,Max Dugan Returns, andZodiac. He composedoriginal music forSaturday Night Fever (for which he received twoGrammy Award nominations), and also worked on several disco adaptations including "Night on Disco Mountain". He won theAcademy Award for Best Song in 1979 for his andNorman Gimbel's theme song forNorma Rae, "It Goes Like It Goes." He was also nominated the same year in the same category for "I'll Never Say Goodbye," from the motion pictureThe Promise, with lyrics jointly written byMarilyn andAlan Bergman. In 1979 his song "With You I'm Born Again," recorded byBilly Preston andSyreeta, was a top five international hit and stayed on the pop charts for 26 weeks.[citation needed]
The Conversation featured a score for piano. On some cues, Shire took the taped sounds of the piano and distorted them in different ways to create alternative sonic textures to round out the score. The music is intended to capture the isolation and paranoia of protagonist Harry Caul (Gene Hackman). The score was released on CD byIntrada Records.
For the "Main Title" ofThe Taking of Pelham One Two Three, Shire set a jazz-funk groove in B-flat minor, and made the lead melodies and chords out of atonaltwelve-tone rows in short bursts of variously shaped motives.[citation needed] The soundtrack album was the first-ever CD release byFilm Score Monthly. The end titles contain a more expansive arrangement of the theme.
Shire's television scores have earned fiveEmmy nominations.[3] His hundreds of scores for television include:Killer Bees;Raid on Entebbe;The Kennedys of Massachusetts;Serving In Silence: The Margarethe Cammermeyer Story;Christopher Reeve'sRear Window;Oprah Winfrey'sThe Women of Brewster Place; andThe Heidi Chronicles. He also composed themes for the television seriesAlice andMcCloud and the 1976-1977Danny Thomas situation comedyThe Practice.
Shire's film and television scoring style is often compared to his late counterpart and contemporaryJerry Fielding.
As a pit pianist, Shire played for the original productions of bothThe Fantasticks andFunny Girl, eventually serving asBarbra Streisand's accompanist for several years. He also intermittently conducted and arranged for her (most notably for her television specialsColor Me Barbra andThe Belle of Fourteenth Street), and over a period of several years she recorded five of his songs.
Shire's musical theatre work, always in collaboration with lyricistRichard Maltby, Jr. includes the two off-Broadway revuesStarting Here, Starting Now (Grammy nomination forBest Cast Album) andCloser Than Ever (Outer Critic's Circle Award for Best Musical) and the two Broadway showsBaby (Tony nominations forBest Musical andBest Score) andBig (Tony nomination for Best Score). All of these shows have had hundreds of regional and stock productions worldwide. A new musical entitledTake Flight premiered in London at theMenier Chocolate Factory in July 2007, with a separate production in Tokyo in November 2007. Previously concert versions were performed in Australia and Russia.[4][5]
A Stream of Voices, a one-act opera, with libretto byGene Scheer, for theColorado Children's Chorale, premiered in June 2008 inDenver.[6]
On October 27, 2012, the Broadway-style musicalLoving the Silent Tears premiered in Los Angeles, including some songs composed by Shire.[7][8]
Shire has conducted many orchestras, either for film scores or for pop concerts, including theLondon Symphony Orchestra, TheLos Angeles Philharmonic, theSan Francisco Opera Orchestra, theBuffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and theMunich Symphony.[citation needed]
Shire wrote and composed many songs for the hitPBS children's TV seriesShining Time Station, which starred his wifeDidi Conn along with comedianGeorge Carlin.[citation needed]
Shire serves on the council of theDramatists Guild of America and is a trustee of the Rockland Conservatory of Music and the Palisades (New York) Library. He was inducted into theBuffalo Music Hall of Fame in 2006.
From 1970 to 1980, Shire was married to actressTalia Shire, with whom he has one son, screenwriter Matthew Shire.
He has been married to actressDidi Conn since 1984. They have a son, Daniel (born October 1992), who was diagnosed withautism.[9]
Shire's brother, Sanford (Sandy) Shire, was also a conductor, most notably for comedian/impressionist Fred Travalena. He also published a book on the paintings of choreographer Antoni Nellé.
