John Barry made James Bond recognisable. Though legally he was never credited with writing the famous tune for one of the longest running film franchises in history, his arrangement of it for the first film, Dr.No, was to literally bring the character to life in our imaginations whenever we hear it. Like the spy himself the tune is sexy, brooding, fast, dangerous.
All in all, Barry composed the scores for 11 of the films in the series. Not all of them were masterpieces, though it is fair to say that the weakest of the films have the weakest of the scores - perhaps there is something to be said about inspiration for a film composer if the film he is composing for isn't all that good. Yet the ones that stand out are the true classics, the giants of film scores: the urgent brass of Goldfinger, the romantic, lush strings of You Only Live Twice, the sense of something new in On Her Majesty's Secret Service.
Of course, Barry didn't just work on Bond films. His haunting themes for Out Of Africa or Midnight Cowboy brilliantly sum up the moods and plots of the respective features. His last Oscar winner, Dances With Wolves, was possibly the one Oscar that the film genuinely deserved to win.
His influences are felt all over the place - his true successor, David Arnold, certainly encapsulates the Barry feel to his Bond scores. It was a shame that he could not have worked on another one, and, though exciting enough the Michael Giacchinho score is, the rumoured score that Barry could have written for The Incredibles would have given the film a lot more class.
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