Issue XXII - Italic Institute of America

Henry Manciniby Don FiorePROFILE.SPopular music in the 1950s and early '60s found anunusually formidable number of Italian American entertainerson stage and in the studios, with Frank Sinatra, DeanMartin, Perry Como, Connie Francis and Liberace listedamong the biggest names in the business. This fact did nottranslate into an extensive popularization of Italian music,though the country was indeed exhibiting a rare receptivenesstoitatthetime, with songs like Volare,AIDiLa andCaraMiafinding their way up the charts.Far from treating their listeners to the torrid passionsof Neapolitan serenades, these perfonners, as a rule, stayedcomfortably within the familiar, artistic boundaries of mainstreamAmerica, recommending Italy more by their surnamesthan by their actual work. What chiefly distinguished each ofthem, instead, was an exceptionally relaxed, naturally smoothmanner of delivery. So relaxed, in fact, that the popular musicclassification into which their talents were pooled came to beknown as "Easy Listening."The ultimate master craftsman of this genre, yetanother Italian American, was the late Hollywood composerHeruy Mancini, who passed away earlierthis year from cancer. In parallel withother successful musicians who shared hisethnic background, the Italic element waspresent in his story, but only in its earliestchapters. His father, a Cleveland steelworker,was an ardent proponent of Italianmusic, performing regularly with theneighborhood concert bands. It wasthrough his persistent encowagement thatMancini decided on a professional musiccareer.The elder Mancini would havedoubtless been delighted had his son takenan affection for or even recognition of themusic of his ancestry on his path to fame and fortune. Alas,he did not, but was wholly fascinated by the Big Band soundwhich, after training at Carnegie and Juilliard, brought himinto association with the Glenn Miller organization duringWorld War II. Mancini's work as an arranger and pianist withthe orchestra led him in tum to Hollywood contacts and thenHollywood contracts. Soon reputed to be one of the industry'smost promising talents, ht was chosen by Universal Studiosto score the Glef111 Miller Story (1954) and The BennyGoodman Story (1956).Though his own personal style of arrangement andcomposition was evolving,the biographicalnature of these filmsnaturally obliged him tolimit his creativity toimitating the styles ofthesubjectsat hand. Notuntil 1959, in fact, wasMancini granted unrestrictedlatitude for compositionaloriginality inproviding the highlystylized and impressionisticmusical backgroundfor the PeterGunn television series. The cool, emotionaUy removed toneof the scores won everyone's attention but certainly nobody'sheart Around the comer, however, was material of a vastlymore appealing nature which would prove that Mancini was byno means just another hack in the soundtrack studios.The revelation of his arrival as a first rate composerwas heard in the pensive and absorbing Moon River, which heinserted in his score for the film Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961).The song was immediately designated a classic and brought itscreator an Academy Award, as did his title piecefor The Days of Wine and Roses the followingyear. These and other compositions. notably DearHeart (1964) and The Sweetheart Tree (1965)distinguished Mancini as a master at conveyingtender sentimentality, a reputation that would bereconfirmed some years later in his score for LoveStory (1971).His talents did not dwell exclusivelymong the gentle nuances of intimate romance, ofcourse; the slyly humorous Pink Panther Themebeing the most famous of Mancini's many interspersionsin the line of love ballads. Whatever themood or emotion he sought to depict via fLimscore, LP. or stage perf cr ~lance with his orchestra,Hemy Mancini unfailing took the high road.Had some sort cultural seismograph been available todetect the latent rumblings of social and artistic change, itsneedle would have skipped off the chart during the years ofMancini's creative peak. Popular music was entering a stageof dramatic transition in which the reigning styles of the daywere gradually ceding primacy to Rock & Roll, which itselfwould mutate from a sort of primitive innocence to psychedelic,and, finally, psychotic expressionism. The nihilisticamorality and artistic destitution in so much of what passes for"music» today makes Mancini's work seem likesophistication's last stand. ****