In Remembrance: Herman Stein

     Herman Stein, the Universal staff composer who worked on many of the studio’s classic science-fiction and horror films of the 1950s, has passed away on March 15, 2007 in Los Angeles, CA. He was 91.

     Born August 19, 1915 in Philadelphia, Stein demonstrated musical talent at an early age, playing piano at the age of 3. By the time he was 15, Stein had taught himself orchestration and had begun to work as an arranger professionally. Through the 1930s and 40s, Stein composed and arranged for both radio programs and big bands, writing music for Count Basie, Bob Crosby, Rob Norvo and Fred Waring. In 1948 he moved to Los Angeles to study composition with Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco.

     Waring was hired by Universal in 1951, where he was put to work on a variety of different pictures. In his first year at the studio he worked on the scores for the westerns The Treasure Of Lost Canyon and Horizons West, the Rock Hudson romantic comedy Has Anybody Seen My Gal?, the fantasy Son Of Ali Baba and the military comedies Back At The Front and Francis Goes To West Point (all 1952).

     In total, Stein worked on over 80 films at Universal in an eight year period. Although most of his work didn’t receive screen credit, his music can be heard in such films as Abbott And Costello Go To Mars (1953), Creature Of The Black Lagoon (1954) and its two sequels, Destry (1954), This Island Earth (1955), The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957) and The Thing That Couldn’t Die (1958). He left Universal in 1959.

     Although Stein turned towards classical composition, he continued to compose for films sporadically through the 1960s. His final score was for the 1966 thriller Let’s Kill Uncle.