Ennio Morricone

He started writing music for films in 1962, but initially, he did it only in the classical format and concept.

It was not until 1964 that he began his famous collaboration with directors Sergio Leone and Bernard Bertolucci. He wrote music for Leone for the film For a Handful of Dollars (Per un pugno di dollari, 1964) and continued with a number of other compositions for a number of spaghetti westerns. In 1968 he began to limit his composing activities only to film music, in the same year he composed music for 20 films.

His collaboration with Sergio Leone is considered the most successful collaboration between a film music composer and a director. Morricone has written music for all the films in which Leone participated as a director or producer.

Morricone's music for the film Good, Evil and Ugly (Il buono, il brutto, il cattivo, 1966, directed by Sergio Leone) is probably his most famous work and together with the overture to William Tell they are one of the most recognizable melodies ever associated with film western genre. Other well-known melodies are the main theme and "Accordion" from Once Upon a Time in the West (1968, directed by Sergio Leone) and Chi Mai - the central theme from the French film Professional.

Although Morricone's collaboration with Leon is probably best known, Morricone himself probably rated the collaboration with directors such as Giuliano Montaldo and Gillo Pontecorvo best. Morricone also often collaborated with his childhood friend Alessandro Alessandroni, who appeared in the film music for Leone's films as a "whistler" because motifs, where whistling appears in the music, are very common in these films.

Morricone received his first Nastro d'Argento Award in 1965 for his music for the film A Handful of Dollars (Per un pugno di dollari) (1964, directed by Sergio Leone), followed by the 1970 Music Award for Metti, una Sera and Cena ( 1969, directed by Giuseppe Patroni Griffi), and a year later for music for the film Sacco and Vanzetti (1971, directed by Giuliano Montaldo). Morricone's first Oscar nomination was in 1979 for music for Days of Heaven ([197, directed by Terrence Malick) and others followed in 1986 for Mission, in 1987 for The Untouchables (1987, directed by Brian De Palma), in in 1991 for Bugsy (1991, directed by Barry Levinson) and in 2001 for the music for the film Málèna (2000, directed by Giuseppe Tornatore).

He composed the music for 24 episodes of the television series Mafia, then the series Octopus, Marco Polo, and others. He also composed music for the film Bio Paradise (Nuovo Cinema Paradiso, 1988, directed by Giuseppe Tornatore).

Morricone's music was recorded by a number of artists on a large number of occasions: Hugo Montenegro had a hit with his version of the melody from Good, Bad and Ugly, both in the UK and the US, and then in 1968 he recorded Morricone's entire album of melodies. John Zorn recorded a record with Morricone's music, as did The Big Gundown in the mid-1980s. He has also collaborated with world artists, such as Portuguese singer Dulce Pontes (in 2003) and cellist Yo-Yo Ma (in 2004) - both of which recorded Morricone's music with the Roman Symphony Orchestra, where Morricone himself conducted the music. Metallica used his Ecstasy of Gold as the opening track in their performances, the Ramones used the melody from Good, Bad and Ugly as a prelude to their performances.

In 2003, Morricone wrote the Japanese drama Taiga, a drama about Miyamoto Musashi, a legendary Japanese samurai.

Morricone toured the Roman Symphony Orchestra in 2005 and visited not only New York and Tokyo, but also Bratislava.

In 2011, Ennio Morricone performed at two concerts for the first time in Prague. He last performed in Prague in January 2019, when he celebrated his 90th birthday with a concert in the sold-out O2 arena. He enjoyed collaborating with the Czech National Symphony Orchestra, and it was this Czech orchestra that recorded the music for Quentin Tarantino's film Eight Terrible, for which Morricone received his first-ever Oscar for film music in 2016. Paradoxically, he had received an Oscar for his life's work eight years earlier.

Ennio Morricone also performed as a guest at the Prague Proms festival, where on July 15, 2018 he performed his music in the Municipal House with the Czech National Symphony Orchestra and Kühn's Mixed Choir.

Ennio Morricone passed away in Rome on 6 July 2020.