by Eric Blume
Michel Legrand in 1981French film composer Michel Legrand passed away this past weekend after six decades of work in the industry. He was truly one of the greats. Chief among his accomplishments was the sung-through score for the masterpiece The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964), delivering music that soared and perfectly caught the melancholy tone of director Jacques Demy’s pastel/sad view of the world. The Legrand-Demy collaboration was deliriously French and remains a pristine achievement over a half century later...
Legrand won three Oscars, for the song “The Windmills of Your Mind” from The Thomas Crown Affair (1968), the score for Summer of ‘42 (1971), and the song score for Yentl (1983). Legrand was surely the best composer for Barbra Streisand, because he wrote numerous melodies that allowed her to do vocal climbs in the most exquisite part of her voice. Her covers of his songs “Pieces of Dreams” and “What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?” are among her best recordings, and his score for Yentl was an inspired combination of traditional Hebrew musical elements and Broadway full-throttle that, whether one likes it or not, allowed Streisand’s vision for the film to fully come to life.
In addition to his film credits, Legrand was an incredible jazz pianist who wrote across several disciplines and mediums. But his film scores and songs had a breathtaking sense of drama, with a willingness to be unabashedly emotional, without turning sentimental. He gave us transcendent melodies and a personal piece of himself. He’ll be greatly missed.