MOVIE MUSIC UK

Composer, conductor and double bassist Terry Plumeri died at his home in Dunnellon, Florida, on March 31, 2016, at the age of 71.

A versatile musician whose career encompassed jazz, classical music and more than 50 film and television scores, Plumeri was best known to film-music listeners for Black Eagle, Sometimes They Come Back, One False Move and Death Wish V: The Face of Death.

John Terryl Plumeri was born in Greensboro, North Carolina, on November 28, 1944, and grew up in Tampa, Florida. He began studying music at ten and took up the double bass while attending Chamberlain High School. He subsequently studied at the Manhattan School of Music with Robert Brennand, principal bassist of the New York Philharmonic, and served in the United States Air Force Band. While working as a bassist with the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, D.C., he also studied composition and conducting with Antal Doráti.

Plumeri initially established himself as a jazz musician. During the late 1960s and 1970s he performed with artists including Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, Cannonball Adderley, Yusef Lateef and Quincy Jones, and toured and recorded extensively with Roberta Flack between 1969 and 1974. He played both acoustic and electric bass on albums including Chapter Two, Quiet Fire and the Grammy-winning Killing Me Softly, for which he also wrote “Conversation Love.” His lyrical approach to the bowed bass became one of his particular musical trademarks.

After moving to Los Angeles, Plumeri increasingly concentrated on film. He became associated with Roger Corman’s New Concorde operation and developed a reputation for producing atmospheric orchestral scores on modest budgets. Among his early credits were the Jean-Claude Van Damme and Sho Kosugi action film Black Eagle (1988), Scarecrows (1988) and the post-apocalyptic horror sequel The Terror Within II (1991). The latter helped lead directly to his assignment on the Stephen King adaptation Sometimes They Come Back (1991), for which Plumeri balanced supernatural menace with a warmer theme reflecting the relationship between the story’s two brothers.

His most acclaimed film work came with Carl Franklin’s One False Move (1992), starring Bill Paxton, Cynda Williams and Billy Bob Thornton. Working with Pete Haycock and Derek Holt, Plumeri created a restrained, blues-inflected score that supported the film’s mixture of crime thriller and Southern tragedy without overwhelming it. The three composers received an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best Original Score, while Franklin won Best Director.

Plumeri continued scoring throughout the 1990s and 2000s, with credits including Stepmonster, Teenage Bonnie and Klepto Clyde, Night Eyes Three, Angel of Destruction, Route 666 and Love Takes Wing. One of his most prominent later action assignments was Death Wish V: The Face of Death (1994), the final film in the original Charles Bronson series. Alongside his screen work he remained active as a concert composer and conductor, eventually appearing as guest conductor with the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra at Tchaikovsky Hall and recording several albums of his orchestral and chamber music.

Plumeri’s life ended violently. On April 1, 2016, deputies conducting a welfare check found him dead inside his Dunnellon home; investigators determined that he had been killed the previous day during an apparent burglary. He had been bound and suffered blunt-force injuries and multiple stab wounds, while the house had been ransacked. Darren Decker and Jessica Baker, suspects in a wider series of daytime burglaries across central Florida, were later indicted for first-degree murder. Decker died following a suicide attempt while in custody in 2017; Baker was subsequently sentenced to 50 years in prison for her role in Plumeri’s death and related burglaries.

Plumeri is survived by his wife Kelly Green, daughter Rowen Holland and granddaughter Jasmine, as well as several brothers and sisters.