Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Lalo Schifrin was born Boris Claudio Schifrin in Buenos Aires, Argentina on June 21, 1932. At the age of six he began a six-year course of study on piano with Enrique Barenboim and at 16 studied piano with Andreas Karalis and harmony with Argentine composer Juan Carlos Paz. By twenty he was attending the Paris Conservatoire during the day and playing at night in jazz clubs.
1955 saw Lalo playing with Astor Piazzolla and on stage at the International Jazz Festival in Paris. Back in Argentina he formed a jazz orchestra, met Dizzy in ’58 and wrote Gillespiana for his big band. He would go on to work with Xavier Cugat, move to New York, take the piano chair in Dizzy’s quintet and wrote a second extended composition titled, The New Continent.
The Sixties had MGM signing Schifrin to his first movie score, he moved to Hollywood, changed The Man from U.N.C.L.E. to a jazz melody and won an Emmy for the theme. He would go on to score television and movies like Mission Impossible, Mannix, Cool Hand Luke, Dirty Harry, The Exorcist, Bullitt and even ABC’s Eyewitness News.
Over the course of his career Lalo Schifrin has recorded over 50 albums and soundtracks, 90 television and film scores as a leader, composer and conductor; and has worked with Cannonball Adderley, Eddie Harris, Count Basie, Luiz Bonfa, Candido Camera, Louis Bellson, Al Hirt, Jimmy Smith, Sarah Vaughan, Cal Tjader, Paul Horn and many others.
In 1997, the composer founded Aleph Records; played an orchestra conductor in Red Dragon, has had his music sampled by hip-hop artists, has been nominated twenty-one times and won four Grammy Awards, one Cable Ace Award, received six Oscar nominations and has a star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame. He continues to compose, conduct and perform.
