John Barry - Black Stockings

The John Barry Seven ‎-- Black Stockings / Get Lost Jack Frost 1960. John Barry Prendergast, (3 November 1933 -- 30 January 2011) born in York, will forever be associated with those magnificent and exciting Bond Scores, but has an enormous reputation for delivering the musical goods in any number of film genres. In a way he was almost predestined to be a film composer, since his mother was a classical pianist and his father owned a number of theatres and cinemas in Lancashire and Yorkshire. As a young boy he would help his father in the cinema, no doubt watching a large number of movies, and developed a fascination for film music whose composition became his ambition. He also had the opportunity to meet many of the Classical and Jazz artists who came to perform in the theatre. While doing his National Service he joined the army band playing trumpet and learned how to arrange jazz. On leaving he formed his owned band “The John Barry Seven“ with which he initially sang before the group moved into instrumental music. Following regular appearances on the BBC TV series “Drumbeat“ the band became very successful with these (as the Shadows were to be later), and had a string of hits including “Black Stockings“. He later developed an interest in composing and arranging music making his début for television in 1958. He came to the notice of the makers of the first James Bond film Dr. No who were dissatisfied with a theme for James Bond given to them by Monty Norman. This started a successful association between Barry and the James Bond films which lasted for 25 years. He received awards for his work, including five Academy Awards; two for Born Free, and one each for The Lion in Winter (for which he also won a BAFTA Award), Dances with Wolves and Out of Africa (both of which also won him Grammy Awards). He also received ten Golden Globe Award nominations, winning once for Best Original Score for Out of Africa in 1986. Barry completed his last film score, Enigma in 2001 and recorded the successful album Eternal Echoes the same year. He then concentrated chiefly on live performances and co wrote the music to the musical Brighton Rock in (2004) alongside Don Black. Barry was married four times and had four children. He moved to the United States in 1975 and lived there for the remainder of his life until his death in 2011.