Richard Stone (composer)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Richard Stone (November 27, 1953 - March 9, 2001) was an American composer. He played a big part in the revival of Warner Bros. animation in the 1990s, composing music and songs for Tiny Toon Adventures, Taz-Mania, Animaniacs, Pinky and the Brain, Freakazoid, The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries, Road Rovers, and Histeria! Many consider him to be a modern-day Carl Stalling.

Stone's work on these cartoons was recorded in the "Eastwood 8" studio at Warner Brothers; For a period of over 10 years his music was recorded in the same room and in fact with the same piano used by Carl Stalling for the same company in the 1940s and 50s.

The 50-piece "Animaniacs orchestra" included legendary studio musicians such as Vinnie Colauta, Rick Baptist, Ralph Humphry, Ian Underwood, and Dominic Ferra.

After studying cello with Lloyd Smith and Orlando Cole in addition to music theory at the Curtis Institute of Music, Stone went on to earn a degree from Indiana University. In 1980 he moved to California to work as a music editor with such composers as Georges Delerue on Platoon and other films) and Maurice Jarre (on The Witness).

He went on to write music for various feature films and television shows, including the Bruce Campbell western "Sundown: The Vampire in Retreat", "Pumpkinhead", as well as "North Shore" (redone in 2003 with original score) and the mini series, "In a Child's Name". Stone worked on John Hughes movies including Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Sixteen Candles. Stone also composed the title-theme and music for the William Shatner series, "Rescue 911".

He died of pancreatic cancer in Los Angeles at age 47. He left behind three ex-wives, Cathy Sumner Stone, Claudia Stone, and Sarah Stevens, as well as two sons, Mike and Rich, both of whom are musicians. Mike is the leader of a jazz quintet that performs regularly in the Bloomington area and Rich is a graduate student in music in Philadelphia.