Michael Gore (Music): In 1981, Michael won two Academy Awards for the movie Fame; one for Best Original Score, and a second for Best Song with lyricist Dean Pitchford. He was also nominated for "Out Here On My Own" from the same film, which he co-wrote with his sister, Lesley Gore, making three nominations that year. Also for Fame, he won a Golden Globe for the title song, and was nominated for a Grammy. The movie's soundtrack sold in excess of 7 million copies worldwide. In 1983, he was again nominated for a Best Score Oscar for James L. Brooks' Terms of Endearment. His instrumental version of the movie's theme went Top 5 on the Adult Contemporary charts. He composed the original score for John Hughes' Pretty in Pink in 1986, and was a major contributor to the musical underscore for James L. Brooks' Broadcast News in 1987. Other scores include Albert Brooks' Defending Your Life, Anthony Minghella’s Mr. Wonderful, The Butcher’s Wife, and Superstar. As a songwriter, he collaborated with lyricist Pitchford on the song "Never" for Herbert Ross' Footloose. With lyricist Lynn Ahrens, he wrote two original songs for Todd Graff’s Camp. Notable in Michael's songwriting credits is the music for Whitney Houston's multi-platinum seller, "All The Man That I Need", which simultaneously reached #1 on the pop, adult contemporary, and rhythm and blues charts. Artists including Luther Vandross, Patti Labelle and L.L. Cool J. have performed his compositions. Michael served as the Producer for a series of nine recordings for the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra. His The Gershwins in Hollywood won Germany’s prestigious Deutsche Schalplatten Award. His Rodgers and Hammerstein’s CD of The King and I starring Julie Andrews and Ben Kingsley received critical acclaim, was Number One on Billboard’s Classical Crossover Album chart for 17 weeks, and remained in the Top Ten for almost a year. As the album’s producer, he was nominated for a Grammy and won The Billboard Award for top Crossover Recording. In addition to Executive Producing ABC’s acclaimed 3-hour Special Event telefilm of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s South Pacific starring Glenn Close and Harry Connick, Jr., he produced all the music for the film and its soundtrack recording. As a solo recording artist, he composed and performed “October Moon” for Song Without Words II for Windham Hill. In addition to developing a slate of original film and television projects with partner Lawrence D. Cohen for their production company, White Cap Productions, he is working on a solo piano album of his own film themes and original pop compositions.
Dean Pitchford (Lyrics): Born and raised in Hawaii and graduated from Yale University, Dean Pitchford performed off- and on-Broadway (Godspell; Pippin) before turning to songwriting, screenwriting and directing. Dean was nominated for four Academy Awards (winning the 1981 Best Song Oscar for Fame, co-written w/ Michael Gore), three Golden Globes (winning for Fame), eight Grammys and two Tonys; his songs - recorded by such artists as Barbra Streisand, Whitney Houston, Cher, Peter Allen, LL Cool J, Kenny Loggins, Hugh Jackman, Dolly Parton, Bette Midler and Martina McBride - have sold over 70 million records. The musical stage adaptation (w/ Walter Bobbie) of his original screenplay for Footloose ran for more than seven hundred performances on Broadway and is now seen all over the world. Dean also provided the lyrics for Carrie, the Musical which was first produced in 1988 by the Royal Shakespeare Company - first in England and then on Broadway - and was then revived in 2012 by New York's MCC Theater. Major productions have recently been seen in London (Southwark Playhouse) and Los Angeles (The Los Angeles Theatre). Dean's middle-grade novels, The Big One-Oh and Captain Nobody, are published by Putnam/Penguin; his performances of their audiobook recordings (Listening Library/Random House) were both nominated for Grammys. His third novel, Nickel Bay Nick, was published to acclaim in 2013, and Dean voiced that audiobook for Audible.com.
