Lee Holdridge Biography

American composer, conductor, and orchestrator

Lee Elwood Holdridge (born March 3, 1944) is a Haitian-born American composer, conductor, and orchestrator. An 18-time Emmy Award nominee, he has won two Primetime Emmy Awards, two Daytime Emmy Awards, two News and Do*entary Emmy Awards, and one Sports Emmy Award. He has also been nominated for two Grammy Awards.

Life and career

Holdridge was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, of a Puerto Rican mother and an American father, Leslie Holdridge, a botanist and climatologist.

While living in Costa Rica, at age ten, he studied the violin with Hugo Mariani, who was at the time the conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra of Costa Rica. He then moved to Boston, where he finished high school and studied composition with Henry Lasker.

As an adult, Holdridge moved to New York City to continue his music studies and begin his career as a professional composer. There, he composed chamber works, rock pieces, songs, theater music and background scores for short films, and eventually came to Neil Diamond's notice. Diamond then brought Holdridge with him to Los Angeles to write arrangements for his forthcoming albums. After several gold and platinum hits, the two collaborated on the Grammy Award winning score for producer/director Hall Bartlett's film adaptation of Jonathan Livingston Seagull. Neil Diamond sued Bartlett for cutting much of his music from the film. Diamond was also against sharing musical credit with Holdridge; however, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences ruled in Holdridge's favor. Bartlett was ordered to reinstate the five minutes of Diamond's music score and three of his songs, "Anthem", "Prologue", and "Dear Father", and that the onscreen credits were to state "Music and songs by Neil Diamond", "Background score composed and adapted by Neil Diamond and Lee Holdridge", and "Music supervision by Tom Catalano".

Holdridge has composed and orchestrated for many films, including:

  • Jeremy (1973)
  • Forever Young, Forever Free (1975)
  • Mustang Country (1976)
  • The Pack (1977)
  • The Other Side of the Mountain Part 2 (1978)
  • Like Mom, Like Me (1978)
  • Moment by Moment (1978)
  • Tilt (1979)
  • French Postcards (1979)
  • American Pop (1981)
  • The Day the Loving Stopped (1981)
  • The Beastmaster (1982)
  • Mr. Mom (1983)
  • Splash (1984)
  • Micki & Maude (1984)
  • Transylvania 6-5000 (1985)
  • The Men's Club (1986)
  • A Tiger's Tale (1987)
  • Big Business (1988)
  • Old Gringo (1989)
  • The Adventures of Pinocchio (1996)
  • Into Thin Air: Death on Everest (1997)
  • The Secret of NIMH 2: Timmy to the Rescue (1998)
  • Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport (2000)
  • Puerto Vallarta Squeeze (2004)
  • Brothers at War (2009).
  • It Is No Dream (2012)

He composed for several television series, including:

  • Sara
  • East of Eden
  • Eight is Enough
  • I'll Take Manhattan
  • Atomic Train
  • The Mists of Avalon
  • American Family
  • The Brooke Ellison Story
  • Moonlighting
  • Beauty and the Beast
  • 10.5

Holdridge has performed and recorded in several concerts, including The Golden Land, the Jefferson Tribute, his suite from the opera Lazarus and His Beloved, the Concerto for Viola and Chamber Orchestra, the Concertino for Violoncello and Strings, the Serenade for Oboe and Strings, the Fantasy Sonata for ‘Cello and Piano, the Elegy for Strings and Harp, and Sonnet for soprano and orchestra.

Personal life

Holdridge is married to ex-ballet dancer Elisa Justice. She is western region audition co-director of the Metropolitan Opera National Council, hosts her own cl*ical music radio show called "Eclectic Cl*ics", and has co-produced a new album and do*entary with Milt Okun called Great Voices Sing John Denver. She won a "Best Producer" award for a do*entary at the Madrid International Film Festival.

Awards and nominations

ASCAP Film and Television Music Awards

CableACE Awards

Emmy Awards

Grammy Awards

International Film Music Critics *ociation Awards

Online Film & Television *ociation Awards

Further reading

  • New York Theatre Critics' Reviews: Index, 1940-1960. Original from the University of Michigan.
  • Of Love & Hope - Selections Form Beauty and the Beast By Lee Holdridge, Don Davis, Milton Okun, Larry Kenton, Edwin McLean. Published 1990, Cherry Lane Music. ISBN:0-89524-484-5

See also

  • List of music arrangers

References

    External links

    • Official website
    • Lee Holdridge at IMDb
    • Lee Holdridge at the Internet Broadway Database
    • Lee Holdridge at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
    • PBS biography as composer for American Valor
    • Lee Holdridge at The Interviews: An Oral History of Television

    Description above from the Wikipedia article Lee Holdridge, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

    Lee Holdridge