About Riz Ortolani

Riziero "Riz" Ortolani (25 March 1926 - 23 January 2014) was an Italian film music composer. Ortolani was born in Pesaro, Italy in 1926. In the early 1950s he founded his own jazz band. In 1962 Ortolani wrote his first film score for Paolo Cavara and Gualtiero Jacopetti's pseudo-documentary "Mondo cane", whose main title-song "More" earned him a Grammy and was also nominated for an Oscar as Best Song. The success of the soundtrack of "Mondo cane" led Ortolani to score films in UK and in the United States such as "The 7th Dawn" (1964), "The Yellow Rolls-Royce" (1964), "The Glory Guys" (1965) and "The Spy with a Cold Nose" (1966). Another renowned track was his main-title for the movie "O Cangaceiro" (1970). Ortolani scored all or parts of over 200 films, including German westerns like "Apache's Last Battle" (1964), and a long series of Italian giallos, spaghetti westerns, Eurospy, exploitation and mondo films. Notable films scored by Ortolani include "Il sorpasso" (1962), "Io ho paura" (1977), "Castle of Blood" (1964), "Anzio" (1968), "The Bliss of Mrs. Blossom" (1968), "Sette orchidee macchiate di rosso" (1972), "Africa Addio" (1966), "Addio Zio Tom" (1971), "House on the Edge of the Park" (1980), "Cannibal Holocaust" (1980) and the first series of "La piovra" (1984). More recently, his music was used on soundtracks for "Grand Theft Auto: London, 1969" (1999), "Kill Bill: Vol. 1" (2003), "Kill Bill: Vol. 2" (2004), "Drive" (2011) and "Django Unchained" (2012). In 2013 he was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award from the World Soundtrack Academy. Riz Ortolani died on 23 January 2014 in Rome, aged 87.