If you've watched more than five or ten movies, or seen more than five or ten television programs, you have heard his work. In the modern era, there are only two other film composers of his stature. John Williams is still alive. Henry Mancini left us in 1994. The third member of that troika, Jerry Goldsmith, alas, is also gone. Jerry died yesterday at the age of 75 from lung cancer.
It is said that we are remembered by our works, but most of us will not leave this plane having implanted in the public consciousness anything as memorable as the themes from Alien, Star Trek: The Motion Picture AND TNG, Papillon, Logan's run, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., The Omen, Planet of the Apes, Patton, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, and so many, many others.
No matter how bad the film, a Jerry Goldsmith score would give it a measure of credibility. Goldsmith could do it all...intense, loving, dreamy, militaristic, eerie, anticipative; a wealth of emotions conveyed by his music without which a motion picture would be wholly incomplete. Jerry Goldsmith is one of the rarest of the rare...a true genius, a creative machine, and an irreplaceable giant in his field.
Yahoo News Story:
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...c_goldsmith_dc
IMDB Listing:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000025/