Laurie Johnson

Biography

Laurie Johnson could very well be most widely known internationally for his name theme for the Diana Rigg/Linda Thorson months from the Avengers. He in addition has labored on a large number of feature movies, including Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove, J. Lee Thompson’s Tiger Bay, Ray Harryhausen’s THE VERY FIRST Men within the Moon, and Brian Clemens’ Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter. Additionally, in Britain he is a documenting artist focusing on instrumental pop music because the middle-’50s, and is among the most respectable arrangers of big-band golf swing and pop music. Educated on the Royal University of Music (where he afterwards trained), he also started his profession as an arranger and composer at age group 19, doing work for Ted Heath and afterwards with such bandleaders as Jack port Parnell and Ambrose. In 1955, he started his documenting profession at Pye Information, a newly-organized business that became the house to artists such as for example Petula Clark and Lonnie Donegan, Tony Hatch, the Searchers, as well as the Kinks. During his initial couple of years at Pye, the majority of Johnson’s produces centered on recordings of pop criteria organized as dance music, together with his very own primary compositions. He also inserted the movie sector in 1955, originally as an arranger and orchestrator, and quickly shifted to structure. Johnson surely got to focus on the music for a few high profile movies within the 1950’s, especially in colaboration with movie director J. Lee-Thompson, like the Great Companions (1956), Tiger Bay (1957), and I Purpose at the Superstars (1960). The last mentioned also proclaimed Johnson’s initial occasion to operate for manufacturer Charles Schneer. Through the early ’60s, Johnson also offered as an helper to film composer Bernard Herrmann, who have scored many of Schneer’s movies manufactured in conjunction with particular results designer-producer Ray Harryhausen, including Mysterious Isle and Jason & the Argonauts; when Herrmann dropped to operate for Schneer any more due to what he regarded the producer’s insufficient fees, Johnson required over by composing the music for Schneer’s creation from the First Men within the Moon (1964). A yr later on, Johnson’s worldwide breakthrough occurred on British tv when he published a new name theme for The Avengers. The series experienced already been within the air flow for four years, but had been revamped with a fresh leading woman (Diana Rigg) and a fresh look, and had been shot on film designed for worldwide distribution. It had been Johnson’s theme, using its starting trumpet flourishes as well as the strategic usage of pizzicato strings, with which People in america 1st came to determine the strike series, and his music was maintained once the series was revamped just as before after Rigg remaining the solid. He later on composed the name music for THE EXPERTS and THE BRAND NEW Avengers, among additional tv series. Johnson’s function also prolonged to theater, using the music for Lionel Bart’s SECURE Your Daughters along with a stage edition from the Four Musketeers. The second option was created with lyricist Herbert Kretzmer, who in addition has collaborated with Johnson with an oratorio-style piece known as The Glory Street, for music group, chorus, solo vocalist, and narrator. His additional concert works add a symphony, a set of symphonic poems, and an RAF-commissioned piece celebrating the Fight of Britain eligible for the Few. Johnson in addition has co-produced several tv series, like the New Avengers, and was mixed up in scoring from the 1998 feature film The Avengers. Through the middle-’90s, he also arranged the London Big Music group, which focuses on big band golf swing and pop music.

Quick Facts