Robert Drasnin

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Robert Drasnin (born November 17, 1927 in Charleston , West Virginia , † May 13, 2015 in Tarzana , California ) was an American composer and conductor . He created some musical works for cinema in the 1960s and 1970s. These include compositions for films such as Ritt im Wirbelwind , The Cabinet of Bloody Hands and The Letter to the Kremlin .

life and career

Robert Jackson Drasnin was born in Charleston, West Virginia in 1927, but has lived in Southern California since 1938. Drasnin studied music at the University of California, Los Angeles , where he graduated in 1949. He then played saxophone, clarinet and flute in the swing bands of Skinnay Ennis and Les Brown . After his military service, Drasnin had fought in the Korean War, he was appointed Associate Conductor of the UCLA Symphony. In the 1950s, in addition to his activity as a conductor, he also played with the orchestra of Tommy Dorsey and the Red Norvo Quintet.

In the mid-1950s, he began writing music for film and television. In the 1960s he wrote music for films such as the Monte Hellman independent western Ritt im Wirbelwind with Jack Nicholson in the lead role, and in the same year he worked for Bert I. Gordon's horror film The Cabinet of Bloody Hands with Don Ameche and Martha Hyer . In 1970 he created for the director John Huston the composition for his crime drama The Letter to the Kremlin .

Between 1958 and 1988 Drasnin composed mainly the music for numerous television films and television series. These include work for TV series such as Time Tunnel , The Seaview - In a Secret Mission , Solo for ONCEL Tennis Rackets and Cannons , Daniel Boone , Mannix , Kobra, Take Over , FBI , Petrocelli , Bronk , Cannon , Serpico , The Streets of San Francisco , CHiPs , Barnaby Jones or Hawaii Five-Zero .

In addition to his work as a composer and conductor for film and television, Drasnin also worked as a lecturer in educational film music, orchestration and music theory at California State University, Northridge and from 1993 to 2014 in the program for film composition at the University of California, Los Angeles ( UCLA).

Robert Drasnin had three children with his wife Marlene. His brother is the documentary film producer Irv Drasnin. Drasnin died at the age of 87 on May 13, 2015 at Providence Tarzana Medical Center, California.

Awards

  • 2008: Inducted into the West Virginia Music Hall of Fame

Filmography (selection)

movie theater

watch TV

  • 1969: The Gold of the Madonna (The Desperate Mission)
  • 1970: Death of a Citizen (The Old Man Who Cried Wolf)
  • 1971: A Taste of Evil
  • 1972: Night of Terror
  • 1972: The Heist Doll ( $ 250,000 )
  • 1979: Danger above the clouds (Crisis in Mid-air)
  • 1983: Who Was Larry Dobbins? (Illusions)
  • 1986: Who Is My Wife (Who Is Julia?)

literature

  • Robert Drasnin. In: David Deal: Television Fright Films of the 1970s. , McFarland, 2014, p. 22

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Obituary for Robert Drasnin in: Variety
personal data
SURNAME Drasnin, Robert
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Drasnin, Robert Jackson
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American composer
DATE OF BIRTH November 17, 1927
PLACE OF BIRTH Charleston , West Virginia , United States
DATE OF DEATH May 13, 2015
Place of death Tarzana , California , United States