User:TurquoiseTriangle

Stephen James Taylor Stephen James Taylor is a Los Angeles based composer best known for his film and TV scores with 4  Emmy nominations, 2  Annie nominations and a DVD-X Award to date. His unique style represents a blend of pop, classical, jazz, world music and experimental surround sound genres.

UNUSUAL PALLETE
One of the ways he achieves his unique sound is by working with a larger pallete of notes than those allowed on conventional instruments. He introduced microtonality to the vocabulary of film music with his ground breaking score to THE GIVING (1992, Eames Demetrios) composed solely using a scale with 58 tones per octave, unequal. Other Taylor scores incorporating microtonal cues include: Why Do Fools Fall in Love (film) (Warner Brothers Pictures) 1998, Gregory Nava), Timon & Pumbaa (TV series) (1995-8), Mickey Mouse Works (1998-2000), THE FINAL INSULT (1997 Charles Burnett),  POWERS OF TIME (1996 Eames Demetrios), A QUESTION OF FAITH (2000 Tim Disney),  The Glass Shield (1995-Charles Burnett)  Black Panther (TV series) (2010 Reginald Hudlin, Marvel), THE EAMES ALUMINUM CHAIR, and  A GATHERING OF ELEPHANTS (Eames Demetrios 2007, 2008).

THEATRICAL AND TV MOVIES
He has written the scores to most of the feature films of Charles Burnett  including the award winning,   To Sleep With Anger (Sony Pictures),  Namibia: The Struggle for Liberation, The Glass Shield,   Selma, Lord, Selma and  Oprah Winfrey's, The Wedding (TV miniseries). For director, Robert Townsend (actor), he has scored several projects including Holiday Heart for Showtime, and the recent feature film about the life of Sonny Liston,   Phantom Punch (film),  starring  Ving Rhames. Other credits include the HBO movie, BOYCOTT, directed by Clark Johnson, the Disney animated theatrical release,  Teacher's Pet (film), as well as a number of television, cable and direct to video movies.

EPISODIC TELEVISION
His prime time music career began in 1981 when he joined the composing team of Mike Post and Pete Carpenter writing and orchestrating for such shows as  Greatest American Hero,  The A-Team,  Magnum, P.I. and  Hunter. He co-wrote the theme to ABC’s Gideon Oliver in 1988 and in 1993 he was hired by  David Chase (who later went on to create and produce The Sopranos) to write the music for the 2nd season of NBC's I'll Fly Away (TV series) resulting in Taylor's 2nd Emmy nomination. Another historically significant network show was Under One Roof (1995 TV series)  for which he wrote the main title song and underscore for the first few episodes. This CBS show was the last primetime black family show on a major, non-cable network.

SPECIAL PROJECTS
In 1996 he was commissioned to write and conduct an orchestral suite, with Mark Watters, for the Atlanta Symphony to perform at the Opening Ceremonies for the Olympics. In 2007, he was also hired to create world music for the lobby of the World of Coca-Cola (museum) in Atlanta as well as do some surround sound design for one of the permanent installations there.

ANIMATION
Taylor’s experience in writing music for animation began with Hanna Barbera and Ruby-Spears in 1980, runs through Spielberg's  Tiny Toon Adventures in the late 80's and several series for Disney TV animation in the 90's such as  Jungle Cubs and  Raw Toonage, up through the present with the recent release of the Black Panther (TV series) for Marvel. He was hired in 1991 to write a new theme for the iconic G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero (TV series) which he also provided the score for 2 seasons. He composed the underscore and main title song for all 3 years of Mickey Mouse Works (later incorporated into the newer show,  House of Mouse) with a 12 piece band that included homemade instruments and fretless guitar. This show represented the first time the core Disney characters (Mickey et al) had been animated for television in 50 years. Taylor's new themes for all the characters contributed to the show's success.

STUDY
He received a bachelors degree in music compostion from Stanford University, after which he continued his studies in classical composition and conducting privately with Henri Lazarof,  Dr. Albert Harris (composer), and microtonality with  Erv Wilson. In recent years he has been expanding his music composition skills into the visual arena via a multimedia programming language known as Max/MSP. As a "music oriented content provider", he has redefined himself as a 21st century composer/artist.