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Howard Shore
Background information
Born	October 18, 1946 (age 60)
Origin	Canada
Occupation(s)	Film composer
Website	http://www.howardshore.com/

Howard Leslie Shore (born October 18, 1946) is an Oscar, Golden Globe and Grammy Award-winning Canadian film composer, best known for composing the scores to The Lord of the Rings film trilogy and films of David Cronenberg.

He was born to a Jewish family in Toronto, Canada, and studied music at the Berklee College of Music in Boston. From 1969 to 1972, he performed with the group Lighthouse. In 1974, Shore wrote the music for Canadian magician Doug Henning's magical/musical "Spellbound" co-starring fledgling actress Jennifer Dale. He was the musical director for the television show Saturday Night Live from 1975 to 1980, appearing in many musical sketches including the All-Nurse Band and dressed as a beekeeper for a John Belushi/Dan Aykroyd performance of the Slim Harpo classic I'm a King Bee. He also suggested the name for the Blues Brothers to Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi.

Shore has written the music for such various major film productions as The Silence of the Lambs, Mrs. Doubtfire, Philadelphia, Ed Wood, Se7en, Dogma, High Fidelity, Panic Room, The Departed and The Aviator, the last of which earned him a Golden Globe. Since The Brood in 1979, he has been a consistent collaborator with David Cronenberg, scoring all his subsequent films except The Dead Zone (1983, scored by Michael Kamen). His score for Cronenberg's Naked Lunch is notable for his collaboration with famed avant-garde jazz musician Ornette Coleman, who praised Shore's work.

Main article: Music of The Lord of the Rings film trilogy

His greatest success to date is his score for Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings film trilogy. The score for the first film, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, including the song Aníron, gained him an Oscar in 2002, while the final film, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, earned him another two Oscars (one for the score and one for the song "Into the West", sung by Annie Lennox) in 2004. (The Two Towers soundtrack was not nominated for the 2003 Oscar.)

Since 2004, he has toured the world conducting local orchestras in the performance of his new symphonic arrangement of his highly acclaimed Lord of the Rings scores. The new work is entitled The Lord of the Rings: Symphony in Six Movements. There are two movements for each of the movies, and an intermission between the second and third movements. The concert presentation of the symphony also includes projected still images relating the music being performed to scenes from the films. Recently, however, Shore has been busy with other projects, leaving other conductors including Markus Huber, Alexander Mickelthwaite, and John Mauceri to lead the orchestras.

Although Shore was originally commissioned to compose the soundtrack for King Kong (indeed, he had already recorded most of the music), he was later replaced by James Newton Howard due to "differing creative aspirations for the score" on his and the filmmakers' parts. This was a mutual agreement between him and Peter Jackson.

Despite this, Shore has a cameo near the end of King Kong as the conductor of the pit orchestra in the theatre.

• He makes a cameo appearance on film in The Return of the King (extended edition) as a Guard of Rohan, during the drinking game at Edoras.
• He is the uncle of composer Ryan Shore.
• Shore was played by Neil Portnow in the 1989 film version of Bob Woodward's book Wired: The Short Life and Fast Times of John Belushi.

• Soul of the Ultimate Nation (MMORPG) (2007)
• The Departed (2006)
• A History of Violence (2005)
• The Aviator (2004)
• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
• The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)
• Spider (2002)
• Gangs of New York (2002)
• The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
• The Score (2001)
• The Cell (2000)
• High Fidelity (2000)
• Analyze This (1999)
• Dogma (1999)
• The Game (1997)
• That Thing You Do! (1996)
• Se7en (1995)
• Ed Wood (1994)
• The Client (1994)
• Philadelphia (1993)
• Mrs. Doubtfire (1993)
• The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
• Naked Lunch (1991)
• The Fly (1986)
• Videodrome (1983)

• List of noted film producer and composer collaborations

• Official web site
• Howard Shore at the Internet Movie Database
• Howard Shore at Soundtrackguide.net
• Howard Shore Interview at Tracksounds