Ennio Morricone To Receive Star On The Hollywood Walk of Fame; Watch THE HATEFUL EIGHT Recording Session

Ennio Morricone accepts an Honorary Academy Award during the 79th Annual Academy Awards at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, CA, on Sunday, February 25, 2007.

The Weinstein Company has released a 7-minute video from the actual recording session of L’Ultima Diligenza per Red Rock (versione integrale) from THE HATEFUL EIGHT.

Featuring the legendary composer, Ennio Morricone, THE HATEFUL EIGHT is nominated for 3 Academy Awards this year, including Best Original Score.

In THE HATEFUL EIGHT, set six or eight or twelve years after the Civil War, a stagecoach hurtles through the wintry Wyoming landscape. The passengers, bounty hunter John Ruth (Kurt Russell) and his fugitive Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh), race towards the town of Red Rock where Ruth, known in these parts as “The Hangman,” will bring Domergue to justice. Along the road, they encounter two strangers: Major Marquis Warren (Samuel L. Jackson), a black former union soldier turned infamous bounty hunter, and Chris Mannix (Walton Goggins), a southern renegade who claims to be the town’s new Sheriff. Losing their lead on the blizzard, Ruth, Domergue, Warren and Mannix seek refuge at Minnie’s Haberdashery, a stagecoach stopover on a mountain pass. When they arrive at Minnie’s, they are greeted not by the proprietor but by four unfamiliar faces. Bob (Demian Bichir), who’s taking care of Minnie’s while she’s visiting her mother, is holed up with Oswaldo Mobray (Tim Roth), the hangman of Red Rock, cow-puncher Joe Gage (Michael Madsen), and Confederate General Sanford Smithers (Bruce Dern). As the storm overtakes the mountainside stopover, our eight travelers come to learn they may not make it to Red Rock after all… (review)

Watch the 7-minute video now.

The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce has announced that Ennio Morricone will be honored with the 2,574th star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on February 26, 2016 at 11:30 a.m. The star in the category of Live Performance/Theatre will be dedicated at 7065 Hollywood Boulevard.

Helping emcee and Hollywood Chamber President/CEO Leron Gubler to unveil the star will be Harvey Weinstein, co-founder of The Weinstein Company, director Quentin Tarantino and Pascal Vicedomini, founder and producer of Los Angeles, Italia – Film, Fashion and Art Festin Association with Mibact, the Italian Trade Agency and SIAE which will be held Feb 21-27, 2016.

Ennio Morricone was born in Rome on November 10, 1928. His long artistic career includes a wide range of composition genres, from absolute concert music to applied music, working as orchestrator, conductor and composer for theatre, radio and cinema. In 1946, he received his trumpet diploma and in 1954 he received his diploma in Composition at the Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia under the guidance of Goffredo Petrassi. He wrote his first concert works at the end of the 1950s, then worked as arranger for RAI (the Italian broadcasting company) and RCA-Italy. He started his career as a film music composer in 1961 with the filmIl Federaledirected by Luciano Salce. World fame followed through the Sergio Leone westerns: A Fistful of Dollars(1964), For a Few Dollars More(1965),The Good, The Bad and The Ugly(1966), Once Upon a Time in The West(1968) and A Fistful of Dynamite(1971). He was recently nominated for an Oscar® for Best Original Score for The Weinstein Company filmThe Hateful Eight which is in contention for several Oscars®. The film recently won a 2016 Golden Globe for Best Score.

In 1965, Morricone joined the improvisation group Nuova Consonanza. Since 1960, Morricone has scored over 450 films working with many Italian and international directors including Sergio Leone, Gillo Pontecorvo, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Bernardo Bertolucci, Giuliano Montaldo, Lina Wertmuller, Giuseppe Tornatore, Brian De Palma, Roman Polanski, Warren Beatty, Adrian Lyne, Oliver Stone, Margarethe Von Trotta, Henry Verneuil, Pedro Almodovar and Roland Joffè. His most famous films (other than the Italian westerns) include:The Battle of Algiers;Sacco and Vanzetti;Cinema Paradiso;The Legend of 1900,Malena;The Untouchables;Once Upon a Time in America;The Missionand U-Turn. His absolute music production includes over 100 pieces composed from 1946 to the present day. Titles includeConcertoper Orchestra n.1 (1957); Frammenti di Eros(1985); Cantata per L’Europa(1988); UT, per tromba, archi e percussioni (1991);Ombra di lontana presenza(1997); Voci dal silenzio(2002); Sicilo ed altri frammenti(2007); Vuoto d’anima piena(2008). In 2001, Morricone began a period of intense concert activity, conducting his film music and concert works for symphony orchestra and polyphonic choir in more than 100 concerts across Europe, Asia, USA, Central and South America.

During his long career, Ennio Morricone has also received many awards. In January of 2016, he won his third Golden Globe and was nominated for an Oscar® for the seventh time, as well as a Bafta for the sixth time. Besides winning the Golden Lion and an honorary Oscar® in 2003, he has won eight Nastri D’argentos, five BAFTAs, seven David Di Donatellos, one Grammy Award and one European Film Award. In 2009, the then President of the French Republic, Nicolas Sarkozy, also signed a decree appointing Morricone to the rank of Knight in the Order of the Legion of Honor.

In the recording field, Morricone has received 27 gold discs, seven platinum discs, three Golden Plates, and the Critica discografica award for the music of the film Il Prato. The soundtrack from the filmThe Good, The Bad and The Uglywas inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2009 while Morricone himself was awarded the prestigious Polar Music prize the following year.
His more recent works include scores for the television seriesKarol and The End of a Mystery,72 Metersand Fateless. In the 21st century, Morricone’s music has been reused countless times for television and in movies including Quentin Tarantino’sKill Bill(2003), Death Proof(2007), Inglourious Basterds (2009) and Django Unchained(2012). In 2007, Morricone received the Academy Honorary Award “for his magnificent and multifaceted contributions to the art of film music”.

In November 2013, he began a world tour to coincide with the 50th anniversary of his film music career and performed in locations such as the Crocus City Hall in Moscow, Santiago, Chile, Berlin, Germany (O2 World), Budapest, Hungary, and Vienna’s Stadhalle. On February 6, 2014, Riccardo Mutti conducted the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performing Morricone’s Voices from the Silence, a cantata Morricone composed in response to 9/11 to give voice to innocent victims. In autumn 2014, Morricone participated in the recording of a documentary about himself by Giuseppe Tornatore, which is yet to be released.

His European tour resumed from February 2015 to March 2015, with 20 concerts in 12 countries, in Europe’s largest arenas, such as the O2 in London and the Ziggo Dome in Amsterdam. Playing to a total of 150,000 spectators and with most of the shows sold out, Maestro Morricone’sMy Life in MusicEuropean Arena Tour was a resounding success.

On June 12th, 2015, Morricone conducted a mass composed in dedication to Pope Francis. It was commissioned by the Jesuit Order to commemorate the 200 year anniversary of the recongregation of the Jesuit Order at the Jesuit Church in Rome.

Giuseppe Tornatore’s The Correspondence, with an original soundtrack composition by Morricone, was released on January 15th 2016.