MOVIE MUSIC UK

Composer Jack Nitzsche died on August 25, 2000, in hospital on Los Angeles, of cardiac arrest brought on by a recurring bronchial infection. He was 63.

Bernard Alfred Nitzsche was born in Chicago, Illinois, in April 1937, the son of German immigrants, and raised on farm in Michigan. He moved to Los Angeles in the late 1950s with aspirations of becoming a jazz saxophonist, but soon found his calling in arranging and studio work. He initially worked for Sonny Bono, but later found his niche working as an arranger for producer Phil Spector. He played a pivotal role in shaping Spector’s the “Wall of Sound,” and was an important contributor to legendary recordings by pop and rock artists including The Ronettes, The Righteous Brothers, Jackie De Shannon (‘Needles and Pins’), and Ike and Tina Turner (‘River Deep Mountain High’).

Later, in the 1960s and ’70s, he collaborated with a wide array of artists, including The Rolling Stones – contributing keyboards and orchestration on several albums, especially songs such as ‘Paint It, Black’ and ‘You Can’t Always Get What You Want’ – and Neil Young, with whom he had a long and occasionally volatile creative partnership.

Nitzsche’s film work was equally distinguished. His first important score was for the 1970 thriller Performance starring Mick Jagger, and he provided ‘uncredited contributions’ to the soundtrack for The Exorcist in 1973. He received his first Oscar nomination for One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest in 1975, and he won an Oscar for the song “Up Where We Belong” from An Officer and a Gentleman in 1982, which he co-wrote with Buffy Sainte-Marie and Will Jennings.

His other important scores include Cruising (1980), Starman (1984), The Razor’s Edge (1984), The Jewel of the Nile (1985), 9½ Weeks (1986), Stand By Me (1986), Revenge (1990), Mermaids (1990), and Blue Sky (1994). His last major score was the for the Sean Penn-director drama The Crossing Guard in 1995; he suffered a stroke in 1998 which ended his scoring career.

Nitzsche had a somewhat turbulent personal life. His first wife was singer Gracia Ann May, who was a member of the girl group The Blossoms. His second wife was songwriter Buffy Sainte-Marie; they married in 1982 and were together for seven years. He also had a relationship with actress Carrie Snodgress, who was previously in a relationship with Neil Young. In 1979, Nitzsche was charged with threatening to kill her after he barged into her home and beat her with a handgun. He pleaded guilty to threatening her, was fined, and placed on three years’ probation. Nitzsche also struggled with alcoholism for much of his life, and in the mid-1990s an inebriated Nitzsche was seen being arrested in Hollywood in an episode of the television show Cops after brandishing a gun at some youths who had stolen his hat.