British composer Stanley Myers was born in Edgbaston England on October 6th, 1930, he studied at Oxford University, and by the mid 1950’s had already established himself as a songwriter and a musical director in theatres for musicals. His first foray into film scoring came in 1958 when he worked on the English motion picture MURDER REPORTED on which he collaborated with Reg Owen. Myers would not return to film music until 1964 when he scored DIARY OF A YOUNG MAN it was also in that year that the composer wrote the music to six episodes of the popular BBC series DR WHO, these episodes were, PRISONERS OF CONCIERGERIE, A BARGAIN OF NECESSITY, THE TYRANT OF FRANCE, A CHANGE OF IDENTITY and GUESTS OF MADAME GUILLOTINE.
In 1967, he provided the score for the controversial movie ULYSSES which was based around the novel by James Joyce. Myers would also conduct many scores for other composers as well as his own and by the time the 1970, s arrived he had become one of Britain’s leading composers of film music and sought after by film directors and producers. It was in 1970 that he penned what was to be his most enduring and famous piece of music, CAVATINA, this was a piece originally written for the movie THE WALKING STICK, which starred David Hemming’s and then later more famously utilised in the Robert de Niro picture THE DEER HUNTER, it is a piece of music that is still to this day played all over the world at some point every day.
During the decades of both the 70’s and the 80’s Myers had a prolific output for movie scores but increasingly turned to writing for television. In 1980, he scored THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES a miniseries that starred Rock Hudson. The films he did work on all contained more than just serviceable scores, but had soundtracks that not only enhanced and underlined every scenario but also stood out as music that could be enjoyed away from the images that it was intended to support, THE RAGING MOON.
During the 1980’s he collaborated with composer Hans Zimmer on numerous projects SUCCESS IS THE BEST REVENGE, PAPERHOUSE and MOONLIGHTING amongst them. As well as writing music for television Myers would often act as a musical supervisor or conductor during this period of his career. His last major film score was SARAFINA starring Whoopi Goldberg in 1992, but as the 1990’s progressed the composer was drawn towards productions for the small screen and his last six scores were for TV productions such as MIDDLEMARCH and HEART OF DARKNESS.
Stanley Myers passed away on November 9th,1993 after a battle with cancer.
MOVIE MUSIC INTERNATIONAL. (MMI) . 