Film Composer Basil Poledouris Presents Award, Conducts Master Class

	Press: to inquire about photo availability and usage, please e-mail us.
	BMI Scholarship winner Tiffany White '01 (center) with Don Wilkins, chair, Film Scoring; President Lee Eliot Berk; Doreen Ringer-Ross, Vice President, Film/TV Relations, BMI; Basil Poledouris, film composer.
	Visiting Artist, film composer Basil Poledouris (left), tours the Film Scoring facilities with Assistant Chair Michael Rendish (right).
	Visiting Artist, film composer Basil Poledouris, talks to students after his master class.

The BMI Film Scoring Scholarship is a yearly tuition scholarship based on compositional maturity and talent as well as financial need. The Dean of the Professional Writing Division, the Chair of the Film Scoring Department, in conjunction with the Department for Scholarships, chose the recipient they felt has the greatest potential for a creative career in film scoring. This year's scholarship was given in the name of composer Poledouris.

"This scholarship continues our mission of supporting young and emerging composers at the college level," stated Ringer-Ross. "We support Berklee's commitment to excellence in music and film scoring and their determination to further the growth of talented, trained and educated composers."

BMI, founded in 1940, is an American performing rights organization that represents more than 250,000 songwriters, composer and music publishers in all genres of music. Through its music performance and reciprocal agreements with sister organizations around the world, it grants businesses and media access to its repertoire of more than 4.5 million songs and compositions.

Tiffany White's previous awards include first place in the NAACP's ACT-SO award competition's Regional Division for Composition and third place in the National Division for Composition. White is the third recipient of the BMI Scholarship. Past recipients include John Eastep and Enrique Menendez, whose scholarships were given in the names of composers Michael Kamen and Alan Menken respectively.

It was John Barry's score for the film Somewhere in Time that triggered White's interest in film music while she was in high school. When the Director of the DeKalb Center for the Performing Arts, which she attended, learned of her interest, he recommended Berklee's Film Scoring Department.

Michael Rendish, Assistant Chair of the Film Scoring Department at Berklee, said, "Tiffany has won the admiration of all of her instructors, and she shows a high level of talent and promise in her chosen profession. We feel she is certainly deserving of this generous award."

Assistant Professor of Film Scoring Jon Klein said, "Tiffany is very musical, with a good melodic sense. She's very conscientious and also very capable technically. She's able to immediately grasp the technical elements of scoring on the computer. Also, she's a pleasure to have in class."

The BMI Scholarship presentation was followed by Basil Poledouris' master class, which was attended by Berklee's film scoring and composition majors. Poledouris began by giving the students some background on how he got started in the film industry, and told many anecdotes about his experiences in creating appropriate scores for films.

Much of Poledouris' talk was advice on how to launch a career in the film industry and the importance of developing relationships with filmmakers -- not just other musicians – because, ultimately, the work will come from those relationships. He admonished the students to find people who are roughly parallel in their film careers, such as film students, and also to develop and maintain relationships with people in the film community, primarily directors. Poledouris used as examples several directors and composers who have had long-term professional relationships, such as Henry Mancini and Blake Edwards, and Steven Spielberg and John Williams. He was impressed to learn that Berklee's Film Scoring Department regularly connects its students with film students from Emerson College and other film schools in the Northeast.

Before his class, Poledouris was given a tour of Berklee's Film Scoring facilities. He remarked, "I know from experience that students come out of here very well prepared. I've worked with Berklee people for a long time, and I've always wanted to come here to see where they came from."

Basil Poledouris was born on August 21, 1945 in Kansas City and is one of a rare breed of film composers who has a working knowledge of other aspects of film- making. He was a student at USC and, besides writing music, was educated in the arts of directing, cinematography, editing and sound. It was while at USC that Poledouris met directors John Milius and Randal Kleiser, for whom he has gone on to compose nine scores, including Big Wednesday (his first feature), Conan the Barbarian, and Farewell to the King.

Poledouris is a composer from the old school, whose scores, more often than not, sound absolutely immense in terms of sheer orchestral power. Since making his feature debut in 1978, Poledouris has scored many successful films, including Robocop, The Hunt for Red October, Free Willy, the hit mini-series Lonesome Dove, for which he received an Emmy Award, and, more recently, the sci-fi blockbuster Starship Troopers. Interestingly, a Basil Poledouris score currently holds the world record for the most expensive CD ever purchased at auction: a rare copy of Cherry 2000, a 1987 science fiction film starring Melanie Griffith, which recently sold in the US for a staggering $2,500!

In 1998 Poledouris scored Bille August's adaptation of Victor Hugo's Les Misérables followed by the Mafia comedy Mickey Blue Eyes and baseball drama For The Love Of The Game. Additional credits include scores to The Blue Lagoon, Red Dawn, White Fang, Lassie, The Jungle Book, music for the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games opening ceremony, and the IMAX films Flyers and Behold Hawaii.

Berklee is the only college in the world that offers an undergraduate degree in Film Scoring, one of the fastest growing departments in the college. The number of students who go into this major has grown significantly in the past few years. Currently there are over 240 in the major.

The curriculum at Berklee is geared toward preparing students for careers in the industry. The recording studio within the department --equipped with state-of-the-art equipment and software-- is run almost as if it were a company, so that students are very much in tune with industry expectations.

A sampling of Berklee alumni actively working in the field of Film Scoring include:

Alan Silvestri '69, Composer: Back to the Future I, II, III, IV, Forrest Gump, Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
Howard Shore '68, Composer: Silence of the Lambs, Mrs. Doubtfire.
Alf Clausen '66, Composer: (TV) The Simpsons.
Hummie Mann '76, Composer: Robin Hood: Men in Tights.
Christopher Brooks '80, Music Editor: Mr. Holland's Opus, Die Hard I,II,III, Batman Forever.
Patricia Van Arx '87, Music Editor: Northern Exposure, Thirty Something.
Peter Rogers Melnick '86, Composer: L.A. Story, Only You.
Eric Reasoner '82 (current faculty), Music Editor: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Last Action Hero, Die Hard III, Lethal Weapon III and IV.

Founded in 1945, Berklee College of Music has been advancing careers in contemporary music for more than 50 years. The world's largest independent college of music, Berklee has a multicultural enrollment of 3,400 students, 40 percent of whom are international. The college's alumni include some of the most respected figures in contemporary music, including many multi-Grammy award winners.

# # #

For more information contact:

Toni Ballard
Publicist
Berklee College of Music
(617) 747-2247
tballard@berklee.edu