More sad news. First Goldsmith, now Bernstein.

LA - As a young piano prodigy, Bernstein was mentored by American composer and conductor Aaron Copland in New York. After stints composing music for U.S. Army Air Force films and for radio dramas, he moved to Hollywood in 1950 and begin writing movie scores, achieving his first hit with the music to the thriller Sudden Fear, starring Joan Crawford.
The films True Grit, The Great Escape, The Great Santini, The Blues Brothers, My Left Foot, Cape Fear, The Age of Innocence, Ghostbusters and Far From Heaven are among the many films Bernstein scored.

Despite being nominated for an Academy Award 14 times, Bernstein won only once: for the score of 1967's Thoroughly Modern Millie, generally considered one of his lesser works.
Bernstein was not related to fellow New Yorker Leonard Bernstein, the famed New York Philharmonic conductor and prolific composer of classical music and Broadway creations like West Side Story.

Wow. Elmer Bernstein was The Man. Right up there with Steiner, Korngold and Morricone.

Between Bernstein & Goldsmith, those guys accounted for nearly EVERY good western score IMO. Elmer did lots of great later J Wayne stuff like THE SHOOTIST (as well as MAG 7/Marlboro theme), while Goldsmith did BREAKHEART PASS and HOUR OF THE GUN and RIO CONCHOS and WILD ROVERS.

In terms of fantasy films, Bernstein's HEAVY METAL stuff was pretty spectacular too ... his music for the Taara sequence is nearly as memorable as Goldsmith's thematic TMP stuff.

I sure hope composers dying don't follow the 'always go in threes' rule ...

If Bernstein had written nothing else besides the "Cape Fear" score, he still would have been one of the great movie score composers imho.

Bernard Herrmann did the original CAPE FEAR score. Bernstein did the remake, but much of the score used Herrmann's original.

No offense meant to Bernstein, but let's give credit where credit is due.

Bernard Herrmann did the original CAPE FEAR score. Bernstein did the remake, but much of the score used Herrmann's original.

No offense meant to Bernstein, but let's give credit where credit is due.

Doh!
I always get those two mixed up....

We also can't forget STRIPES.

He will certainly be missed.

And Robot Monster and Cat Women of the Moon. What a loss... two greats in one month.
R.I.P.

What really scares me is that these things usually happen in threes.

I did love his John Wayne themes.:(