Marvin Hamlisch, who composed or arranged the scores for dozens of movies including The Sting and the Broadway smash A Chorus Line, has died in Los Angeles. He was 68.
Hamlisch collapsed and died Monday after a brief illness, his publicist Ken Sunshine said, citing the family. Other details were not released.
Hamlisch's career included composing, conducting and arranging music from Broadway to Hollywood, from symphonies to R&B hits. He won every major award in his career, including three Academy Awards, four Emmys, four Grammys, a Tony and three Golden Globes.
The one-time child prodigy's music coloured some of Hollywood and Broadway's most important works.
Hamlisch composed more than 40 film scores, including Sophie's Choice, Ordinary People, The Way We Were and Take the Money and Run. He won his third Oscar for his adaptation of Scott Joplin's music for The Sting. His latest work was for Steven Soderbergh's The Informant!
On Broadway, Hamlisch received a Tony and the Pulitzer Prize in 1976 for A Chorus Line and wrote the music for The Goodbye Girl and Sweet Smell of Success. He was scheduled to fly to Nashville, Tennessee, this week to see a production of his musical The Nutty Professor, Sunshine said.
Hamlisch even reached into the pop world, writing the No. 1 R&B hit Break It to Me Gently with Carole Bayer Sager for Aretha Franklin. He won the 1974 Grammys for best new artist and song of the year, The Way We Were, performed by Barbra Streisand.
"He was classic and one of a kind," Franklin said Tuesday after learning of his death, calling him one of the "all time great" arrangers and producers. "Who will ever forget The Way We Were?"
Hamlisch's interest in music started early. At the age of seven, he entered the Juilliard School of Music, stunning the admissions committee with his renditions of Goodnight Irene in any key they desired.
In his teens, he switched from piano recitals to songwriting.
Show music held a special fascination for him. Hamlisch's first important job in the theatre was as rehearsal pianist for the Broadway production of Funny Girl with Streisand in 1964. He went on to work for shows such as Fade OutFade In, Golden Rainbow and Henry, Sweet Henry, as well as arranging dance and vocal music.
"Maybe I'm old-fashioned," he told The Associated Press in 1986. "But I remember the beauty and thrill of being moved by Broadway musicals - particularly the endings of shows. The end of West Side Story, where audiences cried their eyes out. The last few chords of My Fair Lady. Just great."
