Los Angeles – Herman Stein, a staff composer at Universal Studios in the 1950s whose best-known film credits include horror and science fiction classics including “Creature From the Black Lagoon” and “The Incredible Shrinking Man” has died. He was 91.
The Philadelphia-born Stein had written and arranged for radio programs and jazz orchestras, including for Count Basie, Bob Crosby and Fred Waring in the 1930s and ’40s, before becoming a staff composer at Universal in 1951.
Beginning with his first composing assignment – for the Ozzie and Harriet Nelson comedy “Here Come the Nelsons” – Stein wrote scores for every film genre, from an Audie Murphy Western to an Abbott and Costello comedy to a Barbara Stanwyck drama. He also wrote music for the “Ma and Pa Kettle” and “Francis the Talking Mule” film series.
But for science fiction and horror film buffs, Stein’s best-known credits include “Creature From the Black Lagoon,” “The Incredible Shrinking Man,” “It Came From Outer Space,” “This Island Earth” and “Tarantula.”
After leaving Universal in 1958, Stein freelanced as a composer on films that included “The Intruder,” director Roger Corman’s 1962 drama about racism starring William Shatner.
David Schecter, a record producer and film music historian, is Stein’s musical executor. He said that in all, Stein wrote music for nearly 200 movies and shorts.
Stein also composed for commercials, animated cartoons and television, including “Gunsmoke,” “M Squad,” “Wagon Train,” “Lost in Space” and “Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.”
Schecter’s independent label, Monstrous Movie Music, features re- recordings of some of Stein’s classic monster music on four CDs.
“When I told him I wanted to record his monster-movie scores,” Schecter said, “he said, ‘Why do you want to record that? Why don’t you record my good music?’ He meant Westerns and dramas and that stuff, because back in the ’50s that was the prestige stuff.”
