July 26 - Buddy Baker

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On this day, in 2002, Norman Dale Baker passed away in Hollywood, California. Born in Springfield, Missouri on January 4, 1918, Buddy, as most people called him, learned to read music before he could read lyrics. He began playing the piano at the age of 4, learned the trumpet at 11 and had formed his own band by his teen years. He studied music at Southwest Baptist University, eventually earning his doctorate in it before moving to Los Angeles in 1938.

Buddy began his professional career as a trumpet player and musical arranger on the radio programs of the day. He started on The Bob Hope Show before moving on to Jacky Benny and Eddie Cantor's shows. When World War II started, he returned to Bob Hope and became his show's musical director. Buddy brought big band leader Stan Kenton to the show and arranged Ken's first big hit, And Her Tears Flowed Like Wine. Following the war, he added Professor to his resume taking a job at Los Angeles City College in their school of music. He wasn't above helping out his students though. In 1954, he composed the hit jazz song Journey into Love with drummer Louis Bellson. And then one day later that same year, he got a call from another former student, George Bruns, who worked over at the Walt Disney Studio.

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George was looking for someone to compose some music for a couple of episodes of the Disneyland television series and he thought of his former professor. Buddy agreed to spend a couple of weeks at the studio coming up with something for Davy Crockett and the River Pirates. It ended up being a really long two weeks as Buddy wouldn't retire from Disney until 29 years later. In those three decades, he became the studio's musical director and one of the most prolific composers Disney ever had.

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Buddy wasn't as flashy as his contemporaries at the studio. Most people have at least heard of the Sherman Brothers, and don't get me wrong, Robert and Richard Sherman produced some fantastic work over the years, but even though you might not know Buddy's name, a walk through any of Disney's theme parks would be awfully quiet if none of his work existed. The first category we'll talk about is movie scores. He did dozens of them for Disney but a short list of his live action work would have to include Summer Magic, The Monkey's Uncle, The Gnome-Mobile, The Million Dollar Duck, The Apple Dumpling Gang, The Shaggy D.A. and Hot Lead Cold Feet. In 1972, he earned an Oscar nomination for Napoleon and Samantha, which also happened to be Jodie Foster's screen debut. On the animated side of things, Buddy scored several shorts including the classic Donald in Mathmagicland and all three of the original Winnie the Pooh shorts (including additional material for the 1977 Winnie the Pooh feature). In 1981, he made his second foray into animated features providing the score for The Fox and the Hound.

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As impressive as Buddy's film work is, it's in the category of music written for theme parks that some of his most recognizable tunes occur. His most famous song has to be Grim Grinning Ghosts which he wrote with fellow Legend Xavier Atencio for the Haunted Mansion. He also scored the eerie music that can be heard throughout that same attraction. Buddy and Xavier also wrote the original music that is used in the classic Country Bear Jamboree show and the song It's Fun to Be Free for the World of Motion pavilion at EPCOT. Buddy's other music written and arranged for attractions includes The Universe of Energy, America Sings, If You Had Wings, Kitchen Kabaret, Impressions de France, the American Adventure and Tokyo Disneyland's Journey to the Center of the Earth and Sinbad's Seven Voyages. Buddy also came out of retirement briefly in the nineties to arrange his own music for the various Winnie the Pooh rides that popped up in Disney theme parks at that time.

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By the time Buddy retired in 1983, he had over 200 Disney credits to his name. Much of the background music you hear just walking through areas of parks like the Mexican Pavilion at Epcot or Tomorrowland in Disneyland is arrangements of his compositions. When he left Disney, Buddy also had the distinction of being the last composer at a major Hollywood studio. They literally don't make them like him anymore. Buddy didn't stay retired for very long, though. In 1987 he became the director of the University of Southern California's Scoring for Motion Pictures and Television program and taught courses there for the remainder of his life. He received the ASCAP Foundation Life Time Achievement Award in 1999 and having already been declared an official Disney Legend the year before. Three years later, Buddy would pass away from natural causes at the age of 84.