A melody(旋律), also tune, voice, or line, is a linear(線性) succession of musical tones(音樂鈴聲) which is perceived as a single entity. In its most literal sense, a melody is a sequence of pitches and durations, while, more figuratively, the term has occasionally been extended to include successions of other musical elements such as tone color.
Melodies often consist of one or more musical phrases or motifs(主題音樂), and are usually repeated throughout a song or piece in various forms. Melodies may also be described by their melodic motion or the pitches or the intervals between pitches (predominantly conjuct or disjunct or with further restrictions), pitch range, tension and release, continuity and coherence, cadence(節奏), and shape.
Date of birth: 1924 / 09 / 13 (Dead date: 2009 / 03 / 29)
Maurice Jarre (13 September 1924 – 28 March 2009)was a French composer(作曲家) and conductor.(指揮家)Although he composed several concert works, he is best known for his film scores for motion
pictures, particularly those directed by David Lean: Lawrence of Arabia (阿拉伯勞倫斯)(1962), Doctor Zhivago (1965), and A Passage to India (1984). All three of these scores won Academy Awards. Other notable scores of his include The Message (1976), Dead Poets Society (死亡詩社)(1989) and Ghost (第六感生死戀)(1990). Jarre was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.(好萊塢星光大道)His U.K. singles chart record so far reads as thus. Three hits and forty two weeks on the chart with the biggest being 'Somewhere My Love' by the Michael Sammes Singers with lyrics by Paul Francis Webster reaching number fourteen in 1966 and spending thirty eight weeks on the chart.
2000--《夢遊非洲》I Dreamed of Africa 1999--《陽光情人》Sunshine 1997--《日日夜夜》Jour et la nuit, Le (aka., Day and Night) 1996--《追日雙雄》The Sunchaser 1995--《漫步在雲端》A Walk in the Clouds 1993--《劫後生死戀》Fearless 1993--《伴我情深》Mr. Jones 1992--《狼影傳奇》Shadow of the Wolf 1992--《校園風雲》School Ties 1992--《落陽》Rakuyô (aka., The Setting Sun) 1991--《愛你多一些》Only the Lonely 1990--《桃色吸引力》After Dark, My Sweet 1990--《第六感生死戀》Ghost 1989--《敵人，一個愛的故事》Enemies: A Love Story 1988--《迷霧森林十八年》Gorillas in the Mist: The Story of Dian Fossey 1987--《朱麗葉和朱麗葉》Giulia e Giulia (aka., Julia and Julia) 1987--《花轎淚》Palanquin des larmes, Le 1982--《醫生也瘋狂》Young Doctors in Love 1980--《復活》Resurrection 1977--《前進或死亡》March or Die 1973--《諜海龍虎鬥》The MacKintosh Man 1965--《蝴蝶春夢》The Collector 1961--《西非探奇》The Big Gamble
Born in New York on July 22 in 1949, growing up in suburban New Rochelle, was a budding instrumental talent, developing an early interest in Beethoven and Brahms, later taken by the new folk movement, all the while adding rock'n'roll, and virtually anything else his ever-expanding musical universe.
Alan Menken 是一位來自美國的紐約人，出生於1949年7月22日，從小生長在一個喜愛百老匯音樂的家庭中
"I showed an interest in piano at a very young age, but I hated to practice, so when my parents left the room I'd make up my own version of the piece. That's how I started composing", he says. He also took up violin and guitar, played in bands and "did the whole '60s experience, soup to nuts".
"I wanted to be a serious composer, but as a very early age really thought that I couldn't do that because who becomes a composer? Chances were I'd be what every other Menken male in sight was: a dentist. My father was a dentist, my father's father was a dentist, my father's brother was a dentist, my mother's sister's husband was a dentist, my father's sister's husbund was a dentist. I thought that I was my fate".
After earning a degree in music from New York University, Menken worked under Lehman Ingram, the Music Director at the Musical Theater Workshop. He supported himself by writing jingles, accompanying ballet classes (he met his ballerina wife that way), and "musical directing" other people's shows. He also performed his own material in clubs, hoping to become "a singer-songwriter in the Peter Allen / Billy Joel / Elton John / James Taylor / Jackson Browne mode". Musical theater was not a priority. "I auditioned for the BMI workshop to please my parents", he says, referring to the innovative Manhattan-based program that has spawned so many gifted lyricists, composers and librettists. "Then I realized that I really like the challenge of writing for characters, adapting stories, being able to write an entire song score. I discovered I had a gift for writing accessible theatrical material that also had some kind of contemporary thing to it".
在紐約大學取得音樂學位後，他先是在一家當地的芭蕾舞團為其譜曲，也在這裡認識了他的妻子，另外，他還為許多廣告編寫廣告歌曲。後來，他加入了 BMI's Lehman Engel Musical Theater Workshop，並在這家公司展現其才華，一個機緣讓他踏入音樂界。
Composition (相關作品)
1986 Little Shop of Horrors (奇形奇花)
1989 The little mermaid (小美人魚)
1990 Rocky V (洛基5)
1991 Beauty and the Beast (美女與野獸)
1992 Lincoln (林肯傳)
1995 Pocahontas (風中奇緣)
1996 The Hunchback of Notre Dame (鐘樓怪人)
1997 Hercules (大力士)
2004 Home on the Range (放牛吃草)
