Michael Gibson

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Michael Gibson (September 29, 1944 - July 15, 2005) was a musician and orchestrator nominated twice for the American Theatre Wing's Tony Award for Best Orchestrations.

Best known for his work on the original motion picture version of Grease (1978) and the Broadway musical revivals of Cabaret (1998) and Steel Pier (1997), he frequently worked with the famous composer-lyricist partnership of John Kander and Fred Ebb.

Gibson also worked on motion pictures including Merchant Ivory's Roseland (1976), for which he composed, arranged and orchestrated, and Robert Benton's thriller Still of the Night (1981), for which he orchestrated John Kander's score.

Gibson attended Harvard University for two years before transferring to the Berklee School of Music in Boston, Massachusetts to study music composition and theory. After his marriage in 1984, he relied on his wife Ellen and subsequently his son Andrew (b. 1988) as ongoing sources of encouragement and inspiration. Gibson passed away in July 2005 after a lengthy battle with cancer.

[edit] Awards and Nominations

Gibson received Tony Award nominations in 1997 and 1998 for Steel Pier and Cabaret, respectively.

He also received five nominations for the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Orchestrations: My One and Only (1983 - won), Anything Goes (1988), Steel Pier (1997), Cabaret (1998), and The Wild Party (2000).