Click Here To Purchase Killing Me Softly: My Life in Music

Author: Charles Fox

ISBN: 978-0-8108-8221-8

Publisher: Scarecrow Press Inc

Today, Norm Goldman Publisher & Editor of Bookpleasures.com is honored and excited to have as our guest the legendary Charles Fox.

Charles has composed for more than 100 motion picture aniconic television scores, the twice Academy Award nominated, two-time Emmy and Grammy winning composer and Songwriters, Smithsonian and Bronx Hall of Fame inductee has written Killing Me Softly: My Life in Music and has worked with some of the greatest names in entertainment, film, television, and records.

He has also written the theme songs for such television classics as Happy Days, Wonder Woman, The Love Boat, Love, American Style as well as Monday Night Football and The Wide World of Sports.

Norm:

When did you decide you wanted to become and professional musician and what keeps you going?


Charles:

When I was fifteen years old I started playing the piano professionally in the Catskills Mountains in upstate NY.  I soon discovered Latin music and that became a passion in my life.  After that I discovered I had a passion for jazz, classical music, opera, then ballet, pop songs, TV and film music and theater.  I really never thought about doing anything but music in my life.  I still have many dreams to fulfill and I'm having way too much fun along the way to consider slowing down.

Norm:

What influence did Nadia Boulanger have on your writing of popular music and difficult or easy was it to write popular music after you had been trained classically?

Charles:

Nadia Boulanger influenced my whole life in music.  I studied composition with her as well as the more technical aspects of classical music.  I was well trained in composing music and appreciating the works of others in every field.  That helps me enormously when I turn to whatever the assignment is that I'm working on.  I didn't come to pop music easily at first.  I had never listened to the pop music of the day during my formative years, only to classical, jazz, opera and Latin music. However, I came to realize that pop music is an expression like any other and I approach all my work the same way. I still feel my teacher's presence when I write, regardless of the medium. I've been very fortunate that once I got into writing songs, that I've written some that have resonated with people around the world.  I never stop feeling grateful for that.

Norm:

What are the skills you most value in music composers you admire? Which popular composers have exerted the strongest influence on you?


Charles:

I very much admire the pop, theater and film composers who've written the songs that move me most with their lyricism, harmonic invention, melodic structure and freshness of orchestral sounds and
new musical approaches.  Burt Bacharach, Paul McCartney, John Lennon, and Paul Simon are at the top of that personal list of people whose works I admire so much.   I think that of all the great classical composers whose works have seeped into my influences, I would have to say Bartok, Bernstein, Copland, Chopin, Puccini. When I was in high school in New York, I went to the Metropolitan Opera once or twice a week and stood in the standing room section just behind the double basses so I could watch the orchestra close up and study how the individual sounds made up the total orchestra sound. With my head still ringing from those extraordinary Puccini melodies, I would go to the Donnell Music Library and study the scores of those works I loved so.  I had to make a connection between the music I heard and what the composers actually wrote on their scores.

Norm:

How do you prepare yourself mentally before composing a score for television or the movies? As a follow up, what are the elements that make a good music score for televisions and the movies?


Charles:

I prepare for my work in film and tv by watching the movie many times and leaving myself open for what I feel that music can contribute to the film.  I start to develop a sense of what the musical character can be and where it can be helpful in telling the story. Then I start to hear instruments and musical themes and character driven musical ideas.  I begin to develop all those initial expressions.  Some will work, some won't.  I need to be fully engrossed with the film. It's a 24 hour a day job.  The music and the film become my every moment thinking process. I think of a musical score as a dramatist would.  The music is a character on the screen.  It should bind moments together, express underlying feelings, dramatic action where necessary, and in general, give the film a cohesive musical expression.

Norm:

What advice would you give young music composers who aspire to write music for television, movies and commercials?


Charles:

Approach every opportunity as the one that will change your life.

Norm:

 If you have to chose three of the greatest moments in your music career, what would they be and what would be three of the most disappointing?

Charles:

 Number one, looking back, meeting my teacher, Nadia Boulanger.  She gave me a life in music.  I've been so fortunate to win Grammys, Emmys, Oscar nominations, and be inducted into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame, but on a purely personal and emotional level, nothing tops my good fortune in having studied with and being influenced by Mademoiselle Boulanger.

As for disappointments, there aren't many, but I will always regret the way it worked out with Dizzy Gillespie.  On the other hand, I might have had a very different career and I certainly wouldn't want to change that.

Norm:

What motivated you to write Killing Me Softly: My Life in Music and what do you hope to accomplish with its writing?


Charles:

The idea for the book was born in a shoebox full of letters that I wrote home from Paris to my family in the Bronx during the two years that I was a student there.  When we discovered those letters in my mother's dresser drawer, covered and unseen for many years, they became a kind of portal to the past.   A literary agent heard about those letters and asked to read them.  My first reaction was, that they were personal, why would he be interested.  After I relented and sent him a copy of the letters, he called me and said that this would lead to a book that he could get published if I would write the rest of my story; what were the circumstances that brought me to Paris and what has happened in my career since.  I decided that I would take him up on it and write my story.  I thought that it would shed some light on the journey of a contemporary American composer, and that it might be helpful if not inspirational to people who dream about a career in the arts, and wanting to pursue their dreams.

Norm:

Did you learn anything from writing your book and what was it?


Charles:

I learned that I was able to remember so much of my past and put it in perspective.  I can still hear in my head the words spoken to me exactly as those people sounded fifty years ago and more, as though they were taking place right now.  Normally, I'm really only concerned with my current work at hand.  I never go back to watch my old films or TV shows so it was interesting to revisit my past with the book.

Norm:

Where can our readers find out more about you and Killing Me Softly: My Life in Music?

Charles:

The website for the book is:

Killingmesoftly.com

My own personal website which has much of my music and even videos of performances of my music is:

Charlesfoxmusic.com

Norm:

Is there anything else you wish to add that we have not covered?


Charles:

In more recent years, I've been more involved with composing and conducting music for the concert hall, and with theater projects as well. In June 2009 I conducted the Poland National Opera company in an Oratorio that I wrote based on the words of Pope John Paul II at the Warsaw Opera House.  Last year, 2010, the Polish Government commissioned me to compose a piece honoring the 200th birthday of Chopin.  I conducted that work in Gdansk, in the very spot where the solidarity movement started in front of 22,000 people standing.


Click Here To Read Norm's Review of Killing Me Softly: My Life in Music

Click Here To Purchase Killing Me Softly: My Life in Music