Монти Норман

Before he wrote a note for the cinema, Monty Norman sang with dance bands — a start in the trade that left him with an ear for what a tune has to do in its first few bars. Born in London's East End in 1928 and later an airman in the Royal Air Force, he made his name in the musical theatre of the late 1950s and 1960s, working with Julian More and Wolf Mankowitz on Expresso Bongo, Make Me an Offer! and, later, Songbook. Then, in 1962, came Dr. No: Norman fashioned its theme from material he had written for an earlier stage project, John Barry orchestrated it, and a guitar riff became one of the most recognisable signatures in film music. Ivor Novello and Olivier honours followed. He died in 2022. Poppy stood among his later stage pieces, as did the English version of Marguerite Monnot's Irma la Douce, and the shelved musical from which the Bond theme came had been drawn from A House for Mr Biswas. Other films took his music too, among them The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll and The Day the Earth Caught Fire.