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Lalo Schifrin, the legendary composer who penned the Mission: Impossible theme and did scores for more than 100 other films and TV shows ranging from The Cincinnati Kid, Cool Hand Luke and The Sting II to Dirty Harry and the Rush Hour trilogy, has died. He was 93.

His son, writer-director Ryan Schifrin, confirmed to Deadline that his father died “peacefully” on Thursday morning.

Also a pianist and conductor, Schifrin won four Grammys on 19 career nominations spanning 40 years and was six-time Academy Award nominee for The Sting II, The Competition, The Amityville Horror, Voyage of thye Damned, The Fox and Cool Hand Luke. He received an Honorary Oscar at the 2019 Governor Awards.

He earned three consecutive Grammy noms for the stirring, dramatic, 5/4-time Mission: Impossible theme from 1967-69, and variations of his composition have appeared in all of Tom Cruise’s M:i movies. Among those who worked on version of theme for those films are Hans Zimmer,...

Lalo Schifrin, the Grammy-winning composer of “Mission: Impossible” and film scores including “Cool Hand Luke,” “Dirty Harry” and “Bullitt,” died Thursday of complications from pneumonia. He was 93.

The Argentine musician was among the first to apply a broad range of musical ideas to film and TV scores, from jazz and rock to more modern and complex techniques of orchestral writing. His heyday was the 1960s and ’70s, when he produced several film and TV scores that are now regarded as classics.

In November 2018, Schifrin became only the third composer in the history of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts & Sciences to receive an honorary Oscar. Clint Eastwood, for whom Schifrin composed eight scores, made the presentation “in recognition of his unique musical style, compositional integrity and influential contributions to the art of film scoring.”

Actress Kathy Bates said at the event: “His work cannot be easily labeled. Is what he creates jazz?...

Celine Song’s sophomore directorial feature Materialists has everyone talking about love, marriage and more.

Starring Dakota Johnson as Lucy M, a New York City-based matchmaker at Adore, the film watches Lucy work her magic in setting up her clients with their life partners. One instance involves her ninth wedding with bride Charlotte (Louisa Jacobson) having doubts before, but ultimately overcoming them to get married with a pep talk from Lucy. At Charlotte’s wedding, Lucy meets Harry P (Pedro Pascal) who pursues her and lavishes her with luxury dinner dates, huge bouquets of red peonies and more

Also at the wedding, Lucy runs into her ex, John (Chris Evans), an aspiring actor and cater waiter, who she just can’t seem to shake fully. Japanese Breakfast, aka Michelle Zauner, wrote a new song for the film, which played in one of the trailers alongside Madonna’s “Material Girl.”

Find...

Sza knows how to make an entrance. She had the world fiending so hard for her new Lana — first she announced the album drop for Friday at midnight, then kept everyone chewing our fingernails while she took an extra 15 hours to give it the right finishing touches. But it was worth it. Lana arrives just in time to tie a bow around the music year, just like her epochal blockbuster Sos did two Decembers ago. It’s officially part of the deluxe edition “reissue” of Sos, but it stands on its own,...

Roy Haynes, the prolific and proficient jazz drummer who recorded alongside Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Ray Charles, and Sonny Rollins, has died at the age of 99.

Haynes’ daughter Leslie Haynes-Gilmore confirmed her father’s death Tuesday to the Guardian, adding he died following a short illness.

A cutting-edge pioneer in the genre — equally adept at swing and bebop, avant-garde, and fusion — Haynes appeared on countless jazz classics over a career that began in the early 1940s and didn’t wind down until the drummer was in his mid-nineties.

The Boston-born...

When Freddy Wexler was a kid growing up in New York City in the Nineties, there was no artist he loved more than Billy Joel. The 37-year-old singer-producer — who has has written songs for everyone from Justin Bieber and Ariana Grande to Kanye West and Celine Dion — used to sit in his bedroom, put on The Stranger, Turnstiles, or River of Dreams, and dream. “I would imagine it was me performing,” Wexler tells Rolling Stone via Zoom from his house in L.A. “I wanted to be Billy Joel.”

But...

Norby Walters, the onetime music agent who ran the annual “Night of 100 Stars” Oscar party for years and hosted an iconic low-stakes poker party for actors, died December 12. He was 91. His son, Walters Media Group founder and former Bold Films CEO Gary Michael Walters, confirmed the news but did not provide details.

Born Norbert Meyer, in 1952 Walters started booking jazz luminaries such as Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie and Stan Getz into his father’s bar.

Walters and his brother, Walter took over a place from their father and dubbed it Norby & Walter’s Bel Air, but its sign had no ampersand — which led to the name Walters would use during his career. He later took over a failing nightclub located next to the world-famous Copacabana, dubbed it Norby Walters’s Supper Club, and attracted a who’s who of boldfaced New York City names.

“What was I going to do?...

Norby Walters, a music agent who worked with Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Marvin Gaye, Kool & the Gang and Public Enemy before gaining renown in Hollywood for his annual “Night of 100 Stars” Oscar party and weekly poker game, has died. He was 91.

Walters died Dec. 10 of natural causes at an assisted living facility in Burbank, his son, producer Gary Michael Walters (Whiplash), told The Hollywood Reporter.

Walters hosted his first Oscar night gala in 1990 and the last in 2017, most often inside the Beverly Hilton’s Crystal Ballroom. Among those who attended were Shirley Jones, Robert Forster, Charles Bronson, Patricia Neal, Richard Dreyfuss, Eva Marie Saint, Martin Landau, Louis Gossett Jr., J.K. Simmons, Cliff Robertson, Red Buttons, Jon Voight and Allison Janney.

Walters for years also presided over a weekly poker game at his West Hollywood high-rise condo. The low-stakes $2 game was, his son said, “designed to be a place where actors could kibbutz,...

Astrud Gilberto, the Brazilian crooner whose detached, almost observational singing style imbued “The Girl From Ipanema” with inherent cool, died Monday. Her friend, musician Paul Ricci, posted the news to Facebook but did not reveal her cause of death. She was 83.

Gilberto had never performed in public when she recorded “The Girl From Ipanema” with her husband, guitarist João Gilberto and saxophonist Stan Getz, in 1963. Only 22 at the time, the singer — who was born Astrud Evangelina Weinert to a linguistics professor father and singer-violinist mother in Salvador, Brazil on March...

Astrud Gilberto, who was just 22 years old when her lovely, laid-back and sultry vocals on the jazzy bossa nova “The Girl from Ipanema” made the song a massive global hit and one of the most recognizable melodies of the 1960s, died Monday. She was 83.

Her death was announced to the media by a family friend, the musician Paul Ricci, who did not provide additional details.

Born on March 5, 1940, in Salvador, Bahia, and raised in Rio de Janeiro, Gilberto was virtually unknown to the wider public when she was recruited by producer Creed Taylor, saxophonist Stan Getz and her then-husband, guitarist Joao Gilberto, and to lend her vocals on two songs for Getz/Gilberto. The album, recorded in 1963, would have a huge impact on the popularization of bossa nova music, in no small measure due to of one of those songs featuring Astrud: “The Girl from Ipanema,” released as a...

Brazilian singer Astrud Gilberto, best known for her version of the bossa nova classic “The Girl from Ipanema,” has died at the age of 83.

Sofia Gilberto, the artist’s granddaughter, shared the news on Instagram. “I’m here to bring you the sad news that my grandmother became a star today, and is next to my grandfather João Gilberto,” Sofia wrote. “She was a pioneer and the best. At the age of 22, she gave voice to the English version of ‘Girl from Ipanema’ and gained international fame.”

New York-based guitarist Paul Ricci, who collaborated with Gilberto, also confirmed the news on Facebook, saying he had been asked to post it by Gilberto’s son Marcelo. “She was an important part of All that is Brazilian music in the world and she changed many lives with her energy,” Ricci wrote.

Born March 29th, 1940 in the Brazilian state of Bahia, Astrud Weinert...

This post contains spoilers for "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3."

"Out on the third planet closest to the sun, there's a special celebration, and it sounds quite fun." It's called the "Guardians of the Galaxy" saga, but sadly, despite playing out across a whole movie trilogy and a Disney+ holiday special — complete with an alien band performing a musical number — it has never featured Dave Bautista's character, Drax the Destroyer, wailing on the cosmic saxophone like Kenny G.

Little-known fact: on Earth-13122, otherwise known as the Lego Universe (as seen in the "Lego Marvel Super Heroes" comic), Drax had a career as a jazz musician called The Draxophonist. His experience with the saxophone dates back to at least the 1990s, when he was a character in "Warlock and the Infinity Watch," published by Marvel Comics. Issues #12–13 of the series saw Drax fighting the Hulk, and they explored a...

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 director James Gunn apologized to fans who expected Dave Bautista's Drax the Destroyer to showcase his saxophone skills in his Marvel Cinematic Universe swansong.

Gunn responded to a Guardians of the Galaxy fan on Twitter who said they loved the eponymous trilogy but was sad "Super Sax Drax" didn't appear in any of the films. Gunn said the reason Drax didn't replicate the saxophone-loving traits of his Marvel Comics counterpart was that Bautista "has been taking sax lessons for ten years to no avail." However, Gunn joked that Bautista could instead star in a biopic for legendary saxophonist Stan Getz.

Related: Dave Bautista's Best Moments as the McU's Drax the Destroyer

I know. @DaveBautista has been taking sax lessons for ten years all to no avail. Maybe he can star in the Stan Getz biopic. Sorry, Dave! https://t.co/hNVAOBG9nx — James...

James Gunn is always very quick to own up to the opportunities he has missed or the things he had gotten wrong on his movies. Although Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 has been a huge success on all fronts, Gunn today had to make an apology to Dave Bautista and fans for a “mistake” that he made with the former wrestler’s character of Drax the Destroyer.

You could be mistaken for thinking that this is a reference to the often criticized lack of backstory given to Drax over the course of his Marvel appearances when compared to his comic book counterpart, but no it is something even more unforgivable. The fact that Gunn never included Drax’s abilities as a saxophonist. Yes, that is what Gunn “apologized” for via his Twitter account on the back of a fan sharing their feelings of disappointment that Drax had not been...

Zombie Juice, founding member of rap trio Flatbush Zombies, released “Dizzy” on Friday. The new track is the second single to come from Juice’s upcoming debut solo album Love Without Conditions, out April 21.

The song features the Underachievers, who previously worked with Flatbush Zombies on an EP under the name Clockwork Indigo in 2014, and was produced by The Underachievers’ Issa Gold. Juice delivers each line with spitfire accuracy, and the accompanying video splices black-and-white footage with clips of Juice performing on stage to packed venues. “Dizzy” follows his upcoming album’s lead single “Hikari,...

Kali Uchis has revealed her third studio album, Red Moon in Venus. The project is out today 3rd via Geffen Records, and to promote the record, she’s going on a North American tour (get tickets here).

While Uchis’ last album, 2020’s Sin Miedo (del Amor y Otros Demonios), was recorded in Spanish, she sings Red Moon in Venus in English. “Love is the message,” the artist said of the LP. “Red Moon in Venus is a timeless, burning expression of desire, heartbreak, faith, and honesty, reflecting the divine femininity of the moon and Venus. The moon and Venus work together to make key aspects of love and domestic life work well. This body of work represents all levels of love — releasing people with love, drawing love into your life and self-love. It’s believed by many astrologers that the blood moon can send your emotions into a spin, and...

From “Walk on By” to “The Look of Love” to “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head” to “The Blob,” Burt Bacharach composed indelible pop songs that became staples of the soundtrack of their eras.

The prolific tunesmith, who died Feb. 8 at age 94, grew to prominence early in his career by penning film scores and hits (with lyricist partner Hal David) for movies such as “Casino Royale,” “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” “Alfie,” “What’s New Pussycat,” “After the Fox,” “Arthur” and “Night Shift.” And yes, Bacharach and lyricist Mack David (brother of Hal) wrote the late 1950s novelty hit “The Blob,” which stemmed from the 1958 horror comedy that helped propel Steve McQueen to stardom.

From the March 24, 1954, edition of weekly Variety

Bacharach’s first reference in Variety came in the March 24, 1954, edition of weekly, when he was name-checked as the musical director for the Ames Brothers, as part of a...

While some people accuse the Grammys of being a popularity contest, this is not really accurate. The award show often features many acts that are not widely known by the general public, some of which even go on to win big. This year, among the Harry Styleses and Beyonces of music, let’s consider which under-the-radar artist could get their moment to finally shine in the mainstream.

SEEAmerican Music Awards: Can Taylor Swift win Artist of the Year against one of the only people she’s ever lost to? Wet Leg

This female-fronted alternative rock band from the UK has exploded in these past 12 months. Their self-titled debut album is one of the most acclaimed of the year, earning an 87 on Metacritic. The band has also been quite beloved all over the world, peaking at number-one in the UK while entering the top 15 in the US. They’ve also scored...

Biopic of Brazilian singer premiered last month at Telluride.

Austrian doc specialist Autlook Filmsales has taken global sales rights for Brazilian music documentary Miúcha, The Voice of Bossa Nova.

The film premiered in Telluride, showed at TIFF and is due to screen in Brazil at the Festival do Rio Brazilian gala premiere on October 12.

Directed by Daniel Zarvos, a cousin of Miúcha, with Liliane Mutti, the documentary tells the story of the renowned Brazilian singer Heloísa Maria Buarque de Hollanda, known as Miúcha.

Although she recorded with legends of Bossa Nova like João Gilberto, Antônio Carlos Jobim and Stan Getz,...

2022 is the year of Bad Bunny. Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve probably heard of the Puerto Rican rapper’s success worldwide, especially this year. His fourth album, “Un Verano Sin Ti,” debuted atop the Billboard 200 with career-best album units and has held the top spot for 10 weeks as of this writing, the most for any album this year. The album is on track to be the most consumed of the year in the US, and is already the biggest event in music across the globe, breaking streaming records. The album has also notched four top-10 hits in the US, including the top-five hits “Moscow Mule” and “Tití Me Preguntó.” With all of this success, what will the Grammys do with the Latin artist come nomination’s morning, and is there a chance for him to go all the way?

Even among non-Latin albums, it’s...

Where do great movies come from? When Netflix started creating its own shows a decade ago, Ted Sarandos and his colleagues put that question to select creatives around town. It was a smart exercise – but most respondents insisted there was no answer.

Coincidentally I’d been putting out that question at various times over the years with equally ambiguous results. Saul Zaentz, the feisty film and music producer, once offered this response: “Great movies come from terrible people who fight you every step of the way and make your life miserable.”

Misery or not, Zaentz’s indie company managed to produce three Best Picture winners over the years and his music company earned millions from Creedence Clearwater Revival. Never part of Hollywood’s corporate structure, Zaentz and his achievements are a reminder of the banner times in the indie era — from Samuel Goldwyn to John Heyman, Dino De Laurentiis and Francis Coppola.

H.E.R. has dropped a lively cover of Sly and the Family Stone’s 1967 track “Dance to the Music.” The single appears on the upcoming soundtrack to Minions: The Rise of Gru.

The song, produced by Jack Antonoff, sees H.E.R. singing the funk tune over a grooving melody led by bass, saxophones, and synths parts.

“Dance to the Music” follows on the heels of “Turn Up the Sunshine,” a collaboration between Tame Impala and Diana Ross for the animated film’s forthcoming soundtrack, out July 1. That track was also produced by Antonoff,...

Going through the list of previous Album of the Year Grammy winners, you’ll see some familiar faces. Taylor Swift and Adele pop up a couple times, you’ll see critically beloved records like Kacey Musgraves’s “Golden Hour” and Arcade Fire’s “The Suburbs,” some veterans like Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, as well as some big blockbusters like Santana’s “Supernatural.” But among those somewhat predictable picks over the last couple of decades, one sticks out immediately: Herbie Hancock for “River: The Joni Letters.” Now, if you’re on the younger side you might have no idea who Hancock even is, but if you were watching the 2008 Grammys then you were probably shocked by Hancock’s seemingly out-of-nowhere victory. Let’s take a look back.

SEE2021 CMA Awards nominations list: 55th Annual Country Music Association nominees led by Chris Stapleton, Eric Church

Hancock is a jazz musician who...

Of the many music documentaries that screened at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, many – in fact, most – spend a lot of time telling you how great their subjects are. And then there’s “Listening to Kenny G,” which spends a lot of time telling you how much smooth-jazz saxophonist Kenny G sucks.

Mind you, it’d be impossible to make a Kenny G doc without addressing the elephant in the room, which is that the former Kenneth Gorelick is to many, particularly in the jazz community, a living embodiment of everything that can be wrong with popular music. And director Penny Lane, whose previous work includes “Our Nixon” and “Hail Satan?” is smart enough to know she can’t avoid the topic of Kenny G’s extreme divisiveness and playful enough to make it the defining characteristic of her film.

So while we hear from Kenny’s old high-school music teacher,...

Chick Corea, the virtuosic keyboardist who broadened the scope of jazz during a career spanning more than five decades, died on Tuesday from a rare form of cancer. A post on his Facebook page confirmed the news. Corea was 79.

“Throughout his life and career, Chick relished in the freedom and the fun to be had in creating something new, and in playing the games that artists do,” his family wrote in a statement. “Through his body of work and the decades he spent touring the world, he touched and inspired the lives of millions.

Gloria Estefan didn’t enter the music business to become a superhero. Nor did she anticipate becoming a patron saint for Cuban-Americans, nor a musical ambassador to Brazil. But three Grammys, 14 studio albums, and a Presidential Medal of Freedom later, she’s come to embrace all three roles after stumbling upon them.

Like most Florida residents, Estefan has been locked down in isolation during the Covid-19 pandemic. She’s passed the time by cleaning out her closets at home in Miami’s elite celebrity enclave, Star Island, where she resides...

Johnny Mandel, the prolific composer and arranger who worked with Frank Sinatra, Count Basie, Barbra Streisand and more — and famously composed the theme song for M*A*S*H — has died, Variety reports. He was 94.

No specifics about Mandel’s death have been revealed. The news was shared by singer and friend Michael Feinstein on Facebook early Tuesday morning: “A dear friend and extraordinary composer-arranger and all-around brilliant talent Johnny Mandel just passed away. The world will never be quite the same without his humor, wit and wry view of life and the human condition.

Jimmy Cobb, a jazz drummer and the last surviving member of the ensemble sextet of Miles Davis’ iconic album, Kind of Blue, died Sunday lung cancer at his home in Manhattan. He was 91. His wife, Eleana Tee Cobb, made the announcement on Facebook.

The 1959 albumKind of Blue is considered one of the greatest jazz records of all time. At the time of its release, the album was met with rave reviews from critics, widespread radio play and often is regarded as the best-selling jazz album in history, It was certified quintuple-platinum last year. Kind of Blue also was honored as a national treasure by the U.S. House of Representatives.

He worked on several other Davis albums including Sketches of Spain, Someday My Prince Will Come, Miles Davis at Carnegie Hall, and The Complete Blackhawk.

Notable Hollywood & Entertainment Industry Deaths In 2020: Photo Gallery

Born in Washington, D.C. in...

João Gilberto, the pioneering Brazilian musician and composer credited as “the father of bossa nova,” has died at the age of 88.

Gilberto’s son João Marcelo Gilberto confirmed his father’s death Saturday in Rio de Janeiro in a Facebook post, “His struggle was noble. He tried to maintain his dignity in the light of losing his independence.” No cause of death was provided.

Gilberto is considered the progenitor of bossa nova, or “new beat,” a subgenre of the Brazilian samba that scaled back that style’s percussion and arrangements.

João Gilberto, the Brazilian singer and composer best known as a pioneer of the bossa nova style of music, died Saturday in Rio de Janerio. He was 88.

Numerous media outlets reported Gilberto’s death, including the BBC. His son confirmed the news in a Facebook post.

“His fight was noble, he tried to maintain dignity,” Marcelo Gilberto said.

The cause of death was not disclosed.

Born in 1931, Gilberto began singing as a teenager. His style of mixing traditional and modern musical influences inspired the genre that became known as bossa nova or new beat in the 1950s.

His collaboration with American jazz saxophonist Stan Getz, “Getz/Gilberto,” won the Grammy Award for album of the year in 1965.

The album featured their version of the jazz classic “The Girl from Ipanema.”...

Beach Boys frontman Mike Love, ostensibly an authority on beaches, recorded a cover of Ramones “Rockaway Beach” for his upcoming solo album. The cover has more in common with the Beach Boys than the snarling punk original, thanks to big vocal harmonies and even a little Brian Wilson–style “ooh-ee-oooh” falsetto on top of it. The track closes out the LP 12 Sides of Summer, which comes out July 19th.

“It felt so natural to sing it,” Love told Billboard of the cover. “It fits beautifully in the Beach Boys surfing song genre.

In March, the Brazilian style of music known as bossa nova made an unexpected appearance on one of the year’s biggest hip-hop albums: Juice Wrld’s Death Race for Love.

Thank Tommy Brown. During a recording session earlier this year with two other beat-makers, Boi-1da and Jahaan Sweet, Brown came across a striking bossa nova guitar sample. “I pulled up the loop and gave it to 1da,” recalls Brown, who also co-produced Ariana Grande’s juggernaut “7 Rings.” “[1da] put in drums; Jahaan started to add chords.” Juice Wrld, the 20-year-old...

Hope Tala’s “Lovestained” is a hybrid as intrepid as it is airy: The guitar suggests Brazil in 1965, the steel drums add a springy touch of the Caribbean, and the bass seems plucked from an irresistible hit on American rap radio in 1998. “That’s what the vision is: Bringing together bossa nova influences and R&B all into one,” says Tala, who tagged the record as RnBossa on SoundCloud. “There’s an amazing synthesis that can occur between those genres.”

Despite the ease of the fusion, the 21-year-old Tala is relatively new to pop.

Ronnie Scott’s, an iconic British music venue dubbed the “world’s favorite jazz club,” is the subject of a new feature documentary. Kew Media Distribution has boarded sales on “Ronnie’s” (working title) and is warming up buyers at Cannes.

The club is situated in the heart of London’s Soho district. Founded by late saxophonist Ronnie Scott and Pete King, who were inspired by the vibrant post-war jazz venues in New York, it opened its doors 60 years ago, in 1959. Since then, the club has hosted the world’s greatest jazz legends, including Chet Baker, Count Basie, Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald, Stan Getz, Wes Montgomery, Buddy Rich and Nina Simone.

Norah Jones and actor-and-musician Jeff Goldblum are among more recent performers at the club, which also attracts stars of other musical genres, such as Lady Gaga in 2015 and Prince a year earlier.

The film will tell the story of...

Hey, "The Voice" fans. Tonight, April 29, 2019, the top 24 finally performed for your votes to get into the top 13. Of course, the judges: Kelly Clarkson, John Legend, Adam Levine and Blake Shelton were on hand like they always are. For the first time, Apple streams will count as votes. There's a limit of ten streams per eligible song per Apple ID. To get things started tonight, Rod Stokes from Team Kelly hit the stage to sing, "Midnight Rider" by Allman Brothers. They didn't go to the judges for any comments on his performance or any other performances. I'm guessing that's because of time constraints. I mean they had 24 freaking people performing tonight. So, they had to hurry it along. The Voice gets good rating, but not that good. NBC's like, "You guys gotta wrap this show up in two hours." With that said, Matthew Johnson from Team Kelly Clarkson hopped on stage to sing,...

Monday’s two-hour episode of “The Voice” will be jam-packed as two dozen artists take to the stage to sing for America’s votes. Unlike previous seasons of the hit show, this 16th edition does not have the coaches coming into this round with the same-sized teams. Rather, following the live cross battles, Blake Shelton boasts a roster of eight artists while his pal Adam Levine has only four. Both reigning two-time champ Kelly Clarkson and rookie coach John Legend have the usual six artists apiece on their teams.

We’ve done some digging on iTunes and have discovered spoilers of the songs that the Top 24 will perform live on April 29. Take a look below at the titles of these tunes as well as the names of the artists that made them famous. Then cast your vote for the coach that you think has the strongest team at this stage of the season 16 competition.

Michel Legrand, composer of The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, Yentl and The Thomas Crown Affair, died Saturday at the age of 86.

Legrand’s death was first reported by Agence France-Presse. The songwriter’s publicist also confirmed Legrand’s death to Variety, adding that he died early Saturday at his Paris home with his wife, French actress Macha Meril, by his side. His cause of death has not yet been revealed.

Former and current presidents of the Cannes Film Festival Gilles Jacob and Pierre Lescure expressed their condolences to the Paris-born legend on Twitter.

Michel Legrand, the French composer who won three Oscars for his songs and film scores, died Saturday at age 86, according to his official website.

The son of conductor and composer Raymond Legrand, he first made his name as a musician and songwriter and then earned fame in the 1960s composing film scores — particularly Jacques Demy’s big-screen musical “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg,” which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 1964.

Four years later, Legrand won his first Oscar for the hit song “The Windmills of Your Mind” for the thriller “The Thomas Crown Affair.” (A cover by Dusty Springfield became a Billboard hit in 1969.)

Also Read: Hollywood's Notable Deaths of 2018, From Stan Lee to Aretha Franklin (Photos)

He won two more Oscars, for his scores for 1971’s “Summer of ’42” and Barbra Streisand’s 1983 musical “Yentl.”

Over a career that spanned more than six decades, Legrand also racked up 10 additional...

New York’s annual Winter Jazzfest marathon can be a mad scramble. For two nights in freezing January, dozens of groups in every imaginable style take over various downtown venues. Sets overlap, venues span nearly the whole width of downtown Manhattan from Alphabet City to Soho, crowds can swell to capacity, and if you’re trying to see everything, you might come away vexed.

So for the event’s 15th installment, which took place this past weekend, I made peace early on with the fact that I was only going...

Norman Gimbel, an Oscar and Grammy-winning composer whose lyrics graced hit songs such as Roberta Flack’s “Killing Me Softly with His Song” and Jim Croce’s “I Got a Name,” died at the age of 91 on December 19 at his longtime home in Montecito, Calif.

His death was confirmed by Bmi, which paid tribute on its website, noting: “Bmi was greatly saddened to learn of the passing of renowned songwriter Norman Gimbel, a truly prolific and gifted writer who will be greatly missed by his many friends and fans here.”

The Brooklyn native wrote the words to both “The Girl from Ipanema” and the “Happy Days” theme, earning an Academy Award with David Shire for Jennifer Warnes’ “It Goes Like It Goes,” the Best Original Song winner for 1979’s “Norma Rae,” which also garnered Sally Field her first of two Best Actress Oscars.

With his longtime writing collaborator Charles Fox,...

New York’s Hudson River valley has a long history as a haven for artists either fleeing the exhausting grind of New York City or seeking to the area’s natural beauty. It’s where Bob Dylan retreated for an extended retreat following his (possibly exaggerated) motorcycle crash in 1966, it’s where Van Morrison conceived of Moondance, and it’s currently home to — among others — jazz musicians Jack DeJohnette (drums), John Scofield (guitar), John Medeski (keyboards, of Medeski, Martin and Wood) and Larry Grenadier (bass), who formed the newly-organized collective Hudson. People is pleased to premiere their version of Dylan’s “Lay Lady Lay,...

On the occasion of their new mega-release on Leo Records, The Art of Perelman-Shipp Vols. 1-7 and their ensuing CD release party at Le Poisson Rouge on May 7th at 9:30 P.M. with Italian Surf Academy, I asked Ivo Perelman and Matthew Shipp the following questions.

Steve Dalanchinsky: How long have you been associated both as collaborators and friends?

When did you first encounter each other's music?

What projects are planned in the future after this mammoth undertaking?

Talk a bit about how your musical languages differ and where they merge/intermingle.

In brief, discuss your philosophies about free music inside/outside lyricism tune structures as well as spiritual/social ideas/ideals in the music.

Do you feel there are any relevant messages in the music if any?

Is there anything either of you want to add about the ongoing energies/ forces that unite and bind you to each...

On the evening of March 8, famed producer George Martin passed away at home, in his sleep, at age 90. (The announcement was first made on Ringo Starr's Twitter account.) He is, of course, primarily famous as the Beatles' producer, but I was heartened to see many friends in my Facebook feed chose to mark his passing by posting non-Beatles tracks he produced. Martin was a well-established, and well-rounded, producer before he started working with the Beatles. In his career the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee worked in quite a variety of contexts with any number of famous people, from comedy records with Peter Sellers to jazz records with Stan Getz, and practically everything in between.

The Beatles would undoubtedly have become famous without him -- and perhaps he without them -- but they wouldn't have sounded as good. Who else at that time would have made a Beatles record on...

Record executive Bruce Lundvall, who revived Blue Note Records label in the mid-1980s and turned it into a major influence on the contemporary jazz scene during his 25 years as president, has died at age 79. Last year, Bruce Lundvall received the Jazz Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of his enormous contribution to the history and discography of jazz and popular music. In a career spanning 48 years, Mr. Lundvall was responsible for signing and/or nurturing the careers of a wide array of artists, including Willie Nelson, Herbie Hancock, Dexter Gordon, Stan Getz, Chucho Valdes, Paquito D’Rivera, Ruben Blades, […]...

Birdman and Whiplash are both enhanced by their percussion-laden scores. We dig into the music of both of them...

This article contains spoilers for Birdman and Whiplash (including Whiplash's ending)

What makes a great drummer?

That's the question asked by Whiplash, which was up for Best Picture at the Oscars (although ultimately, as you more than likely know, didn't prevail). Damien Chazelle's thriller - easily the most exciting (and horrifying) account of music practice in cinema history - goes head to head with Birdman, another percussion-heavy flick. While the two share an instrument, though, their answers to that question couldn't be more different.

For Whiplash, it mostly seems to boil down to one thing: how quickly can you drum? The opening track of the album makes that clear, as we hear a snare drum banged repeatedly by Andrew (Miles Teller), faster and faster. "Can someone clean the blood off my drum kit?...

Now that the 2015 Grammy Award nominees have been announced, it's time to reflect on a whole history of the honors' biggest winners -- starting with Record Of The Year. The category has always been a mixed bag of most popular, beautifully sung, haplessly catchy or painfully personal recordings. But what you can say is that the category has courted songs that aren't easy to forget. Below, we break down some of our very favorite songs that have been crowned king (or queen) in the category. From Tina Turner to Tony Bennett; from Michael Jackson to Eric Clapton; from Roberta Flack to Adele; Stan Getz to Simon and Garfunkel, we cast a judging eye at history and go, "Great, yeah, thanks, that's stuck in my head now." Which Record of the Year winner is your very favorite of all time? Who in this coming year's crop deserves to win -- Sam Smith,...

Ethan Hawke is to play legendary trumpeter Chet Baker in an upcoming biopic.

The Before Midnight actor will portray the late musician in Born to Be Blue, a film based on Baker's troubled life and career.

The story will follow Baker's comeback in the late 1970s, and the love affair that led him to his eventual resurgence in popularity after years of drug abuse and prison time.

Canadian filmmaker Robert Budreau will direct from his own script, while Carmen Ejogo and Callum Keith Rennie will also star.

Chet Baker was one of jazz's most popular performers, playing with the likes of Charlie Parker and Stan Getz during his career.

He died aged 58 at his hotel in the Netherlands in 1988, with his death ruled as an accident after taking cocaine and heroin.

Listen to Chet Baker's 'My Funny Valentine' below:...

Oscar-winning film producer behind One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Amadeus and The English Patient

The career of the film producer Saul Zaentz, who has died aged 92, was marked not only by his independence (his productions were often largely self-funded) but also by his dedication to each individual film. Unlike most producers, who have numerous projects on the go, Zaentz worked on just one at a time. This resulted in a relatively short CV but one with a high share of Oscars, including three best picture winners: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), Amadeus (1984) and The English Patient (1996).

Zaentz was born in Passaic, New Jersey, the youngest of five children of Russian-Polish Jewish parents, Morris and Goldie. An avid reader and a fan of pop music, movies and sport, he ran away from home as a teenager to work at the St Louis Cardinals baseball team's training camp, then rode...

Produced and distributed by Mvd Entertainment Group, in association with Ediad Productions,"Here's Edie: The Edie Adams Television Collection", available November 19, 2013, is a new four DVD box set, featuring 12 Hours of the early 1960's TV series "Here's Edie" and "The Edie Adams Show".

Performances include classic Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Stan Getz, Andre Previn, Sammy Davis, Jr., Bobby Darin, Johnny Mathis, Nancy Wilson, Buddy Hackett, Bob Hope, Dick Shawn, Rowan & Martin, Peter Falk, Sir Michael Redgrave, Zsa Zsa Gabor and a whole lot more :

"...more than 50 years after it premiered on the ABC network, the variety shows 'Here's Edie' and 'The Edie Adams Show' are set for release on DVD and digital formats, the first time either series has been seen in any format since its original broadcast more than a half century ago.

"The 'wow' factor of this box set resides in the eclectic guest stars Edie Adams...

American music producer who worked with many pop greats including Bob Dylan, Barbra Streisand and Frank Sinatra

Once nicknamed "The Pope of Pop", Phil Ramone, who has died aged 79, worked as a sound engineer and producer with an unparalleled list of popular musicians including Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, Billy Joel, Ray Charles and Barbra Streisand. In 1993, he produced Frank Sinatra's comeback album Duets, which paired the crooner with a host of stars such as Aretha Franklin, Bono and Tony Bennett. Its success prompted a follow-up, Duets II, which was Sinatra's final studio album. Ramone used the celebrity guests concept again for Charles's album Genius Loves Company (2004) and duets albums for Bennett.

Ramone won 14 Grammys during his career and was in demand for television, film and stage projects. He collaborated with Streisand on soundtracks for A Star Is Born and Yentl, worked on stage productions of Chicago, The Wiz and...