Ennio Morricone Composed Ballads for Men
The Italian film composer died at age 91. His scores will live forever.
I’m sitting in my dimly lit room, staring out the window. The symphony in the background is heavy. I’m trying to hold back my tears because men don’t cry. I’m not moping, I’m just listening. Because, you see, sometimes other men create music for violent stories that can penetrate our soul and smash our hearts. These stories are supposed to make men feel powerful. They’re for dudes who smell like testosterone and bleed whiskey.
Morricone’s music, however, creates feelings — a natural chemical reaction in the brain that terrifies manly men.
Ennio Morricone was one of those men who could do that better than anybody on this planet. He wrote and scored music for more than 500 films and TV shows. That’s a lot of tears shed by men.
He was born in Rome on 10 Nov 1928, which was exactly 61 years before my birthday. I mean, precisely. He was a trumpet player before he decided to produce music that will define an entire genre in the film industry. At times, he appeared frustrated by his achievement because, throughout his career, he was mostly evaluated by those scores. Which made up less than 10% of his work.
He refused to call them “Spaghetti Westerns” as he found that term derogatory. The Dollars Trilogy, what he was most famous for, debuted in 1964 and ended in 1966. Then he continued to produce music for film and television for more than five decades. His frustration was understandable but overlooked.
‘I am disturbed when people think about me as a specialist for Westerns. They are only a relatively small percentage of the music I’ve written.’—Ennio Morricone interview, BBC
Despite knowing that and understanding his agony about his devoted career, I won’t lie. If it wasn’t for him and his former classmate, Sergio Leone, I don’t think I would’ve ever fallen in love with the western genre. I grew up in the 90s in Hungary, where cowboys weren’t a thing for us, kids. Years later, I turned out to be a huge cinephile, and when you have the greatest affection for cinema, you just can’t ignore some of the best films that ever been made; The Horse Operas.
I’ll never forget the day when my Dad told me that Once Upon a Time in the West was one of his favorites. I was an adult by then and, throughout my childhood, I had no clue he had a soft spot for westerns — specifically the ones that Morricone contributed to.
I’ll go ahead and say this: Once Upon a Time in the West is the perfect western that has ever been made. Now, we can move on.
A while ago I watched Cinema Paradiso for the first time in my life. It’s a beautifully executed and performed piece about a filmmaker who recalls his childhood in a village where he fell in love with the charm and power of cinema.
Of course, without Morricone’s epic score, it would be much less of a classic.
He stayed loyal to his roots in his whole life despite his undeniable significance in Hollywood. He never lost touch with his Italian heritage, remained in Rome for most of his life, and never bothered to learn English. He just didn’t care. When it was needed, his music spoke for him in such a universal way that no language could.
In an interview with The Guardian, he said, “I was offered a free villa in Hollywood. But I said, ‘No thank you, I prefer to live in Rome.’”
Morricone scored more than 70 award-winning movies, received an honorary Academy Award, and after 6 Oscar-nominations, he finally won for The Hateful Eight’s score. It was the first time that he worked with Quentin Tarantino, although QT couldn’t resist the urge to use Morricone’s work in his earlier movies such as Kill Bill Vol. 1 and the Inglourious Basterds. He gave absolute artistic freedom to the maestro without knowing anything about the music because he was smart enough to not put any limitation on a genius. And let’s be honest, he was probably aroused and mesmerized by the collaboration.
Although, there was a misunderstanding when Morricone, allegedly, gave an interview to Playboy Germany, saying harsh things about Tarantino. Later that was officially denied by him and retracted by the magazine, which admitted its mistake to cite his words falsely.
Nevertheless, Morricone explained in The Guardian’s interview how great it was to work with Quentin, saying, “he gave me no cues, no guidelines. It was perfect.”
However, there were huge regrets on his part in his prosperous career. He missed the chance to work with Stanley Kubrick when he was offered to score the Clockwork Orange. He recalls that Sergio Leone told Kubrick that he was busy composing his film. He also felt sorry declining to work with Clint Eastwood, out of respect to his fellow, Leone, and his legacy.
‘The music I wrote for Sergio Leone belongs to those films.’— Ennio Morricone interview, The Guardian
Morricone died in Rome on Monday, July 6th, a week after suffering a fall in which he broke his femur. He was 91 years old.
I was born on the same day as him, and I wouldn’t mind leaving on the same day when he did. Feeling a hot summer breeze on my skin in Italy, while I make my way to heaven to the angelic Once Upon a Time in the West theme, or shuffle towards hell to the theme of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.
Either way, I would go out of this world with a big-ass smile on my face.