Johnny Mandel
John Alfred Mandel (born November 23, 1925) is an American composer and arranger of popular songs, film music and jazz. Among the musicians he has worked with are Count Basie, Frank Sinatra, Peggy Lee, Anita O'Day, Barbra Streisand, Tony Bennett, Diane Schuur and Shirley Horn.
Johnny Mandel | |
---|---|
Birth name | John Alfred Mandel |
Born | New York City, New York, U.S. | November 23, 1925
Genres | Pop, film music, jazz, folk song |
Occupation(s) | Composer, arranger |
Years active | 1938–present |
Associated acts | Woody Herman, Count Basie |
Mandel has composed, conducted and arranged the music for numerous movie sound tracks. His earliest credited contribution was to I Want to Live! in 1958, which was nominated for a Grammy.
Mandel's most famous compositions include "Suicide Is Painless"[1] (theme from the movie and TV series M*A*S*H), "Close Enough for Love", "Emily" and "A Time for Love" (nominated for an Academy Award). He has written numerous film scores, including the score of The Sandpiper. The love theme for that film, "The Shadow of Your Smile", which he co-wrote with Paul Francis Webster, won the 1965 Academy Award for Best Original Song and the Grammy Award for Song of the Year in 1966.
Career
He studied at the Manhattan School of Music and the Juilliard School. In 1943 he played the trumpet with Joe Venuti, in 1944 with Billy Rogers and trombone in the bands of Boyd Raeburn, Jimmy Dorsey, Buddy Rich, Georgie Auld and Chubby Jackson. In 1949 he accompanied the singer June Christy in the orchestra of Bob Cooper. From 1951 until 1953 he played and arranged music in Elliot Lawrence's orchestra, and in 1953 with Count Basie. Later he resided in Los Angeles, where he played the bass trumpet for Zoot Sims.
A 1944 Band graduate of New York Military Academy, in Cornwall-on-Hudson, New York, he wrote jazz compositions including "Not Really the Blues" for Woody Herman in 1949, "Hershey Bar" (1950) and "Pot Luck" (1953) for Stan Getz, "Straight Life" (1953) and "Low Life" (1956) for Count Basie, as well as "Tommyhawk" (1954) for Chet Baker.
He performed an interpretation of Erik Satie's "Gnossiennes #4 and #5" on the piano for the 1979 film Being There.
He won the Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocal(s) in 1981 for Quincy Jones's song Velas, and again in 1991 for Natalie Cole and Nat King Cole's "Unforgettable", and one year later once more for Shirley Horn's album Here's to Life.
In 2004, Mandel arranged Tony Bennett's album The Art of Romance. Bennett and Mandel had collaborated before on Bennett's The Movie Song Album (1966), for which Mandel arranged and conducted his songs "Emily" and "The Shadow of Your Smile", and was also the album's musical director.
Biography
John Alfred Mandel was born in New York on November 23, 1925.[2] His parents were Alfred, a garment manufacturer, and Hannah, an opera singer, who discovered her son had perfect pitch at the age of five.[3] Mandel was subsequently given piano lessons, but switched to the trumpet and later the trombone.[3]
Mandel married Lois Lee in 1959,[4] and Martha Blanner in 1972,[5] and has a daughter, Marissa, born in 1976.[6] Mandel is also the cousin of the late fellow film composer, Miles Goodman.[7][8]
Honors
In 2018, Mandel received The Grammy Trustees Award, which is awarded by The Recording Academy to "individuals who, during their careers in music, have made significant contributions, other than performance, to the field of recording".
Mandel received an Honorary Doctorate of Music from Berklee College of Music in 1993.
Mandel is a recipient of the 2011 NEA Jazz Masters Award.[9]
Johnny Mandel, A Man and His Music, featuring The DIVA Jazz Orchestra and vocalist Ann Hampton Callaway was recorded live at Jazz at Lincoln Center's Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola in May 2010, released by Arbors Records in March 2011.[10]
Selected works
Compositions
- "A Christmas Love Song" (lyrics by Alan Bergman & Marilyn Bergman)
- "Close Enough for Love" (lyrics by Paul Williams)
- "Emily" (lyrics by Johnny Mercer)
- "Little Did I Dream" (lyrics by David Frishberg)
- "The Shadow of Your Smile" (lyrics by Paul Francis Webster)
- "Suicide Is Painless" (lyrics by Mike Altman)
- "Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams" (lyrics by Alan Bergman & Marilyn Bergman)
- "A Time for Love" (lyrics by Paul Francis Webster)
- "Where Do You Start?" (lyrics by Alan Bergman & Marilyn Bergman)
- "You Are There" (lyrics by Dave Frishberg)
- "The Moon Song" (featured for the first time by Charlie Haden and Pat Metheny in Beyond the Missouri Sky, 1997)
Arrangements
- 1956: Hoagy Sings Carmichael by Hoagy Carmichael
- 1960: Ring-a-Ding-Ding! by Frank Sinatra
- 1966: "Emily" and "The Shadow of Your Smile" from The Movie Song Album by Tony Bennett
- 1975: "Mirrors" by Peggy Lee
- 1981: "Velas" from The Dude by Quincy Jones
- 1992: Here's to Life by Shirley Horn
- 1992: The Christmas Album by Manhattan Transfer
- 1995: Pearls by David Sanborn
- 1999: When I Look in Your Eyes by Diana Krall
- 2001: You're My Thrill by Shirley Horn
- 2004: The Art of Romance by Tony Bennett
- 2009: Love Is the Answer by Barbra Streisand
Filmography
Johnny Mandel composed and/or arranged music for the following motion pictures or television programs:
- 1958: I Want to Live!
- 1960: The 3rd Voice
- 1961: The Lawbreakers
- 1963: Drums of Africa
- 1964: The Americanization of Emily
- 1965: The Sandpiper
- 1965: Mister Roberts (TV series; 1 episode)
- 1966: Harper
- 1966: The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming
- 1966: Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre (TV series; 2 episodes)
- 1967: Point Blank
- 1968: Pretty Poison
- 1969: Heaven with a Gun
- 1969: That Cold Day in the Park
- 1969: Some Kind of a Nut
- 1970: M*A*S*H
- 1970: The Man Who Had Power Over Women
- 1972: M*A*S*H (TV series; 12 episodes)
- 1972: Journey Through Rosebud
- 1972: Molly and Lawless John
- 1973: The Last Detail
- 1973: Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams
- 1974: W
- 1975: Escape to Witch Mountain
- 1976: Freaky Friday
- 1976: The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea
- 1979: Agatha
- 1979: Being There
- 1979: The Baltimore Bullet
- 1980: Too Close for Comfort (TV series; 2 episodes)
- 1980: Caddyshack
- 1982: Deathtrap
- 1982: Lookin' to Get Out
- 1982: The Verdict
- 1986: Amazing Stories (TV series; 1 episode)
- 1989: Brenda Starr
Discography
- 1953: Dance Session with Count Basie (Clef)
- 1966: Quietly There, Bill Perkins Quintet (Riverside)
- 1958: A Sure Thing: David Allen Sings Jerome Kern (Pacific Jazz)
- 1983: The Shadow of Your Smile...Pinky Winters Sings Johnny Mandel...with Lou Levy (Cellar Door)
- 1984: Zoot Sims Plays Johnny Mandel: Quietly There (Fantasy)
- 1993: A Time for Love...The Music of Johnny Mandel, Bill Watrous (GNP Crescendo)
- 1994: Fred Hersh Plays Johnny Mandel: I Never Told You So (Varèse Sarabande)
- 2011: Johnny Mandel, A Man and His Music, with The DIVA Jazz Orchestra and Ann Hampton Callaway (Arbors)
- 2014: Quietly There, Harry Allen/Jan Lundgren Quartet (Stunt)
References
- "MASH | full Official Chart History | Official Charts Company". Officialcharts.com. Retrieved April 10, 2020.
- Strunk, Steven (2003), Mandel, Johnny [John Alfred], Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.J286900
- Aswad, Jem. "ASCAP Henry Mancini Award Honoring Johnny Mandel". Archived from the original on April 10, 2012. Retrieved February 8, 2014.
- California, Marriage Index, 1949–1959, a subscription site. Retrieved February 26, 2014.
- California, Marriage Index, 1960–1985, a subscription site. Retrieved February 26, 2014.
- Contemporary Musicians: Profiles of the People in Music. 28. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Gale. 2000. ISBN 978-0787632533.
- "Miles Goodman, 47, Composer for Films". The New York Times. August 20, 1996. Retrieved May 1, 2015.
- Jablon, Robert (August 18, 1996). "Miles Goodman, Film Composer and Jazz Record Producer, Dies". Associated Press. Retrieved May 1, 2015.
- National Endowment for the Arts (January 4, 2011). "National Endowment for the Arts Announces Live Webcast of 2011 NEA Jazz Masters Awards Ceremony & Concert on January 11, 2011". Washington: National Endowment for the Arts. Retrieved February 19, 2014.
- DIVA: Sherrie Maricle. Retrieved February 10, 2014.
External links
- Johnny Mandel at AllMusic
- Johnny Mandel on IMDb
- Johnny Mandel at the Songwriters Hall of Fame
- Interview with Marc Myers at JazzWax
- Alumni of Distinction at New York Military Academy archives page
- NAMM Oral History Interview August 26, 2009