Lee Holdridge was born in March, 1944 in Port-Au-Prince, Haiti. He spent his early
years in Costa Rica, beginning music studies on the violin at the age of ten with Hugo Mariani,
then the conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra of Costa Rica. At fifteen (the age at
which he became determined to be a composer) he moved to Boston to finish high school and study
composition with Henry Lasker. In 1962, Holdridge moved to New York at age eighteen to continue
his music studies and begin his professional career as a composer. While in New York, he wrote
chamber works, rock pieces, songs, theater music, and background scores for short films.
Holdridge's successes in New York came to the attention of legend Neil Diamond, who brought
Holdridge to Los Angeles to write arrangements for Diamond's forthcoming albums. A string of
gold and platinum hits followed, which led to Diamond and Holdridge collaborating on the film
score for Jonathan Livingston Seagull in 1973.
Since that time, Holdridge has scored over 150 film and television projects. In the 1980's,
Holdridge scored the biggest motion pictures of his career, including such popular favorites
as
Splash,
The Beastmaster,
El Pueblo del Sol, and
Old Gringo. His
television work was (and has remained) far more prolific, with early television efforts
highlighted by music for
Moonlighting,
Beauty and the Beast, and
East of
Eden. After scoring the film
Pastime in 1991 (winner of the Audience Award at the
Sundance Film Festival), Holdridge concentrated heavily on television films and mini-series,
as well as highly acclaimed documentaries. Among others, Holdridge has written music for films
on NBC, CBS, ABC, PBS, Turner (TNT), HBO, and Showtime. His heavily dramatic work for
Into
Thin Air and
Into the Arms of Strangers was offset by flamboyant children's songs
opposite Rachel Portman's score in
The Adventures of Pinocchio.
In addition to his film career, Holdridge has had an extensive repertoire of concert works
performed and recorded, and has also worked with many major recording artists. He has written,
arranged and conducted for Placido Domingo (leading to several CD album releases), Barbra
Streisand, Brian May of Queen, Stevie Wonder, Neil Diamond, John Denver, Al Jarreau, Dionne
Warwick, Diana Ross, Natalie Cole, and many others. Holdridge has received numerous awards and
nominations during his career, including five Emmies, two of which for
Beauty and the Beast.
He received both Emmy and Grammy nominations for his title song for "Moonlighting," which he
co-wrote with Al Jarreau, and he also received the prestigious "Circle of Friends of Music" award,
given in Italy in 1972 for his "Ballet Fantasy for Strings and Harp." His theatre works include the
Opera "Lazarus and his Beloved," the Broadway musical "Into the Light," and co-authorship of the
Joffrey Ballet standard "Trinity."
Continuing his extensive assignments for television films and series in the 2000's, Holdridge
exploded into mainstream pop culture once again with his massive orchestral score for the TNT
mini-series
The Mists of Avalon in 2001. Ranking at the top of many film music critics'
lists of top scores for the year,
The Mists of Avalon sailed on to magnificent success on
CD album. With heartfelt scores for Latino-themed projects (from the dramatic
Old Gringo to
the PBS TV series "American Family"), Holdridge long remained one of only a few major Latino
representatives in a scoring industry otherwise dominated by composers of American
and European origins.
Lee Holdridge in 2003
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