March 8 - Bruce Broughton

Image courtesy magazine.scoreit.org

On this day, in 1945, Bruce Broughton was born in Los Angeles, California. As the grandson of a composer, the nephew of a songwriter and the son of musicians, you might think it natural that Bruce has become an award winning composer himself, but he laughingly calls it more of a default position, not one he aspired to. He wanted to be an animator when he grew up but since there wasn’t a lot of support for that dream in the family, he dutifully studied music when he entered the University of Southern California. His act of rebellion was, since he felt he was already a good enough piano player, to study composition instead of piano. But it wasn’t until one day, after listening to a song that riled him up and he realized that he could write music to make people feel things, that composing started to become a lifelong passion. It helps that he had plenty of talent to back that passion up.

Image courtesy hulu.com

Bruce began his professional career in television, a medium he admits most composers don’t like because of the quick turnaround time (but he really enjoys). His first credits came in the early Seventies on shows like Gunsmoke and Hawaii Five-O.  He’s worked steadily on the small screen since then. Some of his longest running gigs include Quincy (64 episodes), Dallas (52 episodes) and Tiny Toon Adventures (11 episodes as well as the main theme). Over the years, he’s been nominated 22 times for an Emmy, winning ten of them. His latest work can be heard on the current Fox show The Orville (Bruce composed the main theme and scored the first several episodes).

Bruce made the leap to the big screen in 1983, scoring The Prodigal. Two years later, he earned an Oscar nomination for his work on the Western Silverado (he lost to Out of Africa). Since then, his work has been heard on dozens of projects as diverse as the remake of Miracle on 34^th Street to the experimental Michael Jackson film Moonwalker.

Image copyright Disney

Bruce is no stranger to the symphony concert stage either, even though he feels it’s harder to engage the audience with nothing visual to help out. He’s written 12 full orchestral pieces, 32 compositions for chamber groups and another dozen concertos and the like for symphonic band ensembles.

For his first Disney score in 1990, Bruce was given the task of creating music for the first theatrically released animated sequel in the company’s history, The Rescuers Down Under. This meant he not only had to incorporate elements of Artie Butler’s work from the first movie but then had to translate it into a sweeping adventure set in another country. He was more than up to the task and began a long relationship with the studio.

Image copyright Disney

For the silver screen, Bruce has scored Disney pictures including Honey, I Blew Up the Kid, Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey, Homeward Bound II, Betsy’s Wedding, Shadow Conspiracy, Krippendorf’s Tribe, The Three Musketeers (the animated version with Mickey, Goofy and Donald) and Bambi II (which technically was a direct to video project but is still feature length). For Fantasia 2000, Bruce was conductor and musical supervisor for the Rhapsody in Blue segment.  He also scored two episodes of The Wonderful World of Disney and both made-for-television movies based on the Eloise books (winning an Emmy both times, thank you very much).

Image copyright Disney

Bruce’s most often heard compositions, though, were the pieces he did for various Disney theme parks (even if, sadly, most of them are no longer operational). If you ever experienced any of the following attractions, you’ve heard one of Bruce’s scores: The Timekeeper (known as From Time to Time in Paris and Tokyo), Cinemagique (Paris), The Making of Me (Wonders of Life pavilion, Epcot), Honey, I Shrunk the Audience (Imagination pavilion, Epcot), Ellen’s Energy Adventure (Universe of Energy pavilion, Epcot), One Man’s Dream (Disney’s Hollywood Studios), Seasons of the Vine (Disney’s California Adventure) or Golden Dreams (Disney’s California Adventure). The one place you can still hear his work is on Spaceship Earth in Epcot (so I suggest you run right over there and take a listen before they change everything on us).

In between all his composing, Bruce has managed to find time to be the Governor of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (the Oscar people), the Governor of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (the Emmy folks), President of the Society of Composers and Lyricists (they don’t give out any awards) and is currently on the board of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP). He is also a lecturer at USC and still actively writes music. Who knows, the next time you find yourself in a darkened theater, you just might see the words Music by Bruce Broughton.