Russell Garcia

Russell Garcia, QSM (12 April 1916 – 19 November 2011) was an American composer and arranger who wrote a wide variety of music for screen, stage and broadcast.

Garcia was born in Oakland, California, but was a longtime resident of New Zealand. Self-taught, his break came when he substituted for an ill colleague on a radio show. Subsequently, he went on to become a composer/arranger at NBC Studios for such television shows as Rawhide 1962 and Laredo, 1965–67. He worked at Universal Studios and MGM, where at the latter he composed and conducted the original scores for such films as George Pal's The Time Machine (1960) and Atlantis, the Lost Continent (1961). He also orchestrated the music for Father Goose (1964) and The Benny Goodman Story (1956). Garcia collaborated with many Hollywood musicians and celebrities, including Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong, Anita O'Day, Mel Torme, Julie London, Oscar Peterson, Stan Kenton, Maynard Ferguson, Walt Disney, Orson Welles, Jane Wyman, Ronald Reagan, Andy Williams, Judy Garland, Henry Mancini, and Charlie Chaplin making arrangements and conducting orchestras as needed. Russ loved to ski so he would write on-site scores to ski-content films.

Personal life One of five brothers, Garcia grew up in what he said was an "ordinary" household where music was something that came out of the radio. In 1966, at the height of his career, the Garcias sold their home and possessions, bought a boat, and set sail on June 1. However, the couple knew nothing about sailing and Gina did not know how to swim; the early arrival of Hurricane Alma forced them to return after only two days at sea. It was December before damage to the boat was finally repaired and they set forth once again. This time they reached Nassau without further complications and spent several years as "travel-teachers" for the Baháʼís as they went around the world to places like the Galapagos Islands, Haiti, Cuba, Jamaica, Tahiti and the Marquesas Islands.

When they reached Fiji in 1969, musicians from Auckland, New Zealand, invited Garcia to do some live concerts, radio and television shows and to lecture at various universities around the country on behalf of the New Zealand Broadcasting Commission and Music Trades Association. Russell, when finished with his lectures and concerts and on advice of friends, drove up to the Bay of Islands in the north of North Island. Garcia and his wife fell in love with the location and bought a house on the water's edge of Tangitu Bay in the Te Puna Inlet, east of the Purerua Peninsula near Kerikeri.

On 27 May 2005 the L.A. Jazz Institute honoured Garcia for his more than 60 years of contributions to jazz. The evening was hosted by Tierney Sutton and guest speakers included Bill Holman, Duane Tatro and Bud Shank. Charmed Life: Shaynee Rainbolt Sings Russell Garcia is a recent CD release featuring his work in collaboration.

Professional career When he was eleven years old, the Oakland Symphony Orchestra performed his arrangement of "Stardust". By the time Garcia was in high school, he was working five nights a week playing music and earning more than his father, who was a credit manager in a large department store. After one year at San Francisco State University he dropped out because he felt he was not learning enough and instead went on the road with several big bands. But he remained unsatisfied because, he said, "I wasn't advancing fast enough." He recalled, "I quit and went to Hollywood and had lessons with the best teachers I could find." He studied composition, harmony, orchestration, counterpoint and form. He took lessons on every instrument so he could write for each with a deeper awareness, rather than just by ear as he had done in the past. He also conducted the West Hollywood Symphony Orchestra once a week for two years, a remarkable experience for a young man in his 20s; he said it primed him for what was to come.

His first break came in 1939, when the composer/conductor of the radio show This is Our America fell ill and Garcia was recommended to fill in. He so impressed the director, Ronald Reagan, that he was kept on for two years. Reagan was then married to Jane Wyman who recommended Garcia to NBC, where he was hired as a staff composer and arranger. As word got out, he said he never had to look for work: "It's always come to me. I do lead a charmed life." Soon after, Henry Mancini called on Garcia and his extraordinary talent of transcribing note for note, instrument for instrument, to work on The Glenn Miller Story.

Universal Studios contracted Garcia to work as composer, arranger and conductor in the 1950s. He remained in the post for 15 years.

According to Garcia's obituary in the Los Angeles Times and his obituary by Marc Myers in Jazzwax, a daily jazz blog for "the 65-piece studio symphony"

In 1957, through his Universal Studios contract, he arranged and conducted Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald's record album Porgy And Bess. with brass players Frank Rosolino, Tommy Pederson, Maynard Ferguson and Herbie Harper. Marty Paich can even be heard on some of these sessions at the piano. He used this instrumentation and sound in collaborations with singers like Frances Faye and Anita O'Day, and brought it back in his most recent collaboration: a recording of all Garcia originals with New York vocalist Shaynee Rainbolt.

Although he loved what he was doing, he decided to walk away from it all in 1966. "I fought in the Battle of the Bulge during World War II and vowed that if I ever got out of it alive, I was going to dedicate myself to world peace." The Garcias decided to sail the Pacific Ocean, carrying the message of peace and the Baháʼí Faith to the remote islands of the South Pacific. Garcia said, "Not many people have the chance to follow their hearts with no financial worries. We had the "charm" working for us: we knew the royalties would see us through for some years." They spent the next six years on their 13-metre fiberglass trimaran the Dawn-Breaker, as "traveling teachers," anchoring in such exotic locations as Jamaica, the Galapagos Islands, the Marquesas and Tahiti.

In Fiji, in 1969, the "charm" spun again when musicians visiting from Auckland invited Garcia, on behalf of the New Zealand Broadcasting Commission and the Music Trades Association, to do live concerts, radio and TV shows as well as lecture at universities around the country, a perfect fit seeing as Garcia is also known in music circles as the author of what are considered the definitive textbooks on composition: The Professional Arranger Composer Books I and II. They have been translated into six languages and are used in universities and conservatories around the world.

At the age of ninety-two, Garcia was still composing and touring internationally, and he conducted his own 95th birthday concert in Kerikeri.

Discography 1950 – Radar Secret Service 1953 – Limelight (miscredited 1972 Oscar for Best Original Dramatic Score given to Raymond Rasch and Larry Russell) 1954 – Buddy DeFranco and Oscar Peterson Play George Gershwin 1955 – Wigville 1955 – Four Horns and a Lush Life 1956 – The Johnny Evergreens 1956 – That Old Black Magic (Peggy Connelly, leader) 1956 - Our New Nellie (Nellie Lutcher, leader) 1956/57 – About the Blues (Julie London, leader) 1956 – The Complete Porgy and Bess 1957 – Porgy and Bess (Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong) 1957 – Louis Under the Stars (Louis Armstrong) 1957 – I've Got the World on a String (Louis Armstrong) 1957 - Enchantment 1957 – The Warm Feeling 1957 – Listen to the Music of Russell Garcia 1957 – Make Love to Me (Julie London) 1957 – Sounds in the Night 1957 - Sleepy Lagoon (Si Zentner With Russ Garcia And His Orchestra) 1958 – Anita Sings the Winners (Anita O'Day) 1958 – Carioca 1958 - Here's to My Lady (Bobby Troup With Russ Garcia And His Orchestra) 1959 – Get Happy! (Ella Fitzgerald) 1959 – Jazz Music for Birds and Hep Cats 1959 – Fantastica: Music From Outer Space (see Theodore Keep) 1960 – Cool Velvet (see Stan Getz) 1960 – Swingin' on the Moon (Mel Tormé) 1960 – Margaret Whiting Sings the Jerome Kern Songbook (Margaret Whiting) 1960 – Soubrette Sings Broadway Hit Songs (Blossom Dearie) 1960 – The Time Machine (soundtrack) 1961 – Atlantis, the Lost Continent (soundtrack) 1965 – Laredo (soundtrack) 1965 – "Adventure in Emotion" on Stan Kenton Conducts the Los Angeles Neophonic Orchestra 1966 – The Pad and How to Use It (soundtrack) 1968 – Three Guns for Texas (soundtrack) 1975 – I'll Never Forget What's Her Name 1979 – Variations for Flugelhorn, String Quartet, Bass & Drums 1980 – I Lead a Charmed Life 1986 – Jazz Variations 1996 – Artistry in Jazz Buddy Childers with the Russ Garcia Strings 2002 – The Unquenchable Flame (about Táhirih) 2009 – Charmed Life: Shaynee Rainbolt Sings Russell Garcia

His Baha'i music includes the music (and non scripture lyrics) for 1960s and 1970s songs "One Heart Ruby Red" (with Donna Taylor), "Nightingale of Paradise" (with Gina Garcia), "Hollow Reed", "We Will Have One World", "The Hatin' Wall" (with Donna Taylor), "Live in the Glory" (with Dorothy Wayne), "Hidden Words", and "Into Parched and Arid Wastelands"

In his nineties, he composed original music for "A Path to Peace", a piece inspired by the Baha'i writings that included his wife's lyrics. The Path to Peace incorporated nine major principles from The Promise of World Peace, published by the Baháʼí international administrative body, the Universal House of Justice, in 1985. The "rinciples that promote peace include the equality of men and women, universal education, and the elimination of extremes of wealth and poverty."