Daily Archives: August 7, 2012

Marvin Frederick Hamlisch – Style Icon

Posted on by

The late composer Marvin Hamlisch moved effortlessly across film, theater and TV, creating unforgettable music with the power to unleash tears and laughter.  You may not know just how much of an influence he has had on your life, he is part of the American experience.

Birth name:  Marvin Frederick Hamlisch
Born:  June 2, 1944 New York City, New York
Died: August 6, 2012 (aged 68) Los Angeles, California
Occupations: Composer, conductor
Associated acts: Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Seattle Symphony Orchestra, Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Pasadena Symphony and POPS, San Diego Symphony, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra

Marvin Frederick Hamlisch was an American composer. He was one of only eleven people to have been awarded Emmys, Grammys, Oscars, and a Tony. He was also one of only two people to have won those four prizes and also a Pulitzer Prize (the other was Richard Rodgers). Hamlisch also won two Golden Globes.

A few months before he turned seven, in 1951, he was accepted into what is now the Juilliard School Pre-College Division. His first job was as a rehearsal pianist for Funny Girl with Barbra Streisand. Shortly after that, he was hired by producer Sam Spiegel to play piano at Spiegel’s parties. This connection led to his first film score, The Swimmer.

1972: Won Golden Globe and nominated for best original song at the Academy Awards for Life Is What You Make It (from Kotch).

1974: Won three Oscars, four Grammys (including best new artist) and a Golden Globe for The Way We Were, from the movie of the same name, and for The Sting score.

1976: Won Tony for best original score in A Chorus Line, and a Pulitzer Prize; nominated for a 1986 Academy Award for Surprise, Surprise from A Chorus Line.

1978: Nominated for an Oscar and Grammy for The Spy Who Loved Me theme (Nobody Does It Better) and score.

1979: Nominated for an Oscar for The Last Time I Felt This Way (from Same Time, Next Year).

1980: Nominated for an Oscar and Grammy for Theme From Ice Castles.

1983: Nominated for an Oscar for the Sophie’s Choice score.

1990: Nominated for an Oscar and Grammy for The Girl Who Used To Be Me (from Shirley Valentine)

1996: Won two Emmys for Barbra Streisand: The Concert.

1997: Nominated for an Oscar for I’ve Finally Found Someone (from The Mirror Has Two Faces).


Advice From Yourself

Posted on by

Advice From Yourself

For this exercise, you are going to need a piece of paper, a pen, and some free time to think. You will need the free time first, I suggest you noodle on it while you are doing your daily thirty minutes of cardio. (You are doing thirty minutes of cardio every day, aren’t you? I’m not interested in your excuses.) Ask yourself this question:

If you could use a time machine just once to travel back and tell yourself one sentence, what age would you travel back to and what would you say?

If we had a month to go back in time and be the guidance counselors to our younger versions, I would let you write paragraphs with bullet points. I would let you outline a schedule of future events and how you should handle them. You only have a couple minutes to give yourself one sentence of advice and it should be in the form of advice. I am the first to admit that if I could, I would go back to 1985 and whisper in my ear to buy Microsoft stock when it goes public, but that really isn’t what this exercise is about.

Mine would be 14 years old and I would say “Hi, I’m you in the future, I came back to tell you that there is an amazing life for you with limitless possibilities out there, you just need to be fearless and know that you can do absolutely anything you put your mind to.”

Now that you have had time to think about it and come up with one sentence that you would want to tell the younger you, write it down on a piece of paper. I know one sentence is hard no one is going to make you diagram it if it turns out to be a bit of a run on, but try to keep it to one sentence.

You are all ready to go back in time, you have your one sentence script, you know exactly what you want to tell yourself. Go to your bathroom mirror. Read the sentence.

You can’t go back in time, but it is never too late. Life has not passed you by, it may be passing you by, it it is never too late. If you went back in time and whispered to yourself to become a teen pop star, that may not have been the best use of your one trip in a time machine, but you can still adapt it to your life today. Take singing lessons, surround yourself with kids, take hip hop dance lessons. It is never too late for hip hop dance lessons.

My guess is that most of you gave yourself advice similar to mine, to stand up, stand out, not be afraid of going after your dreams, grasp for the brass ring, to love hard and fearlessly, and to wring every ounce of juice out of life.

Tape that piece of paper to your bathroom mirror, read it every morning and honor that younger you by making up for lost time. You can’t go back in time, but it’s never too late.