Frank Skinner

The author of the textbook "F.Skinner's Simplified Method for Modern Arranging" (published 1934) began his musical career as a pianist in vaudeville alongside his brother Carl. He then became a noted arranger for New York dance orchestras in the 1930's and was briefly active in the field of music publishing. Skinner's debut in Hollywood was as arranger for MGM's The Great Ziegfeld (1936). After completing work on the picture, he went on to spend the remainder of his lengthy career as composer/orchestrator for Universal (1938-1966) under the aegis of department head Joseph Gershenson. Skinner became best known for his horror film scores, but he was immensely prolific and versatile, handling all manner of subjects (albeit, the vast majority of his films were second features). He often worked in collaboration with the Austrian-born composer Hans J. Salter. Skinner's best-known film compositions include the dramatic main theme for Universal's "Sherlock Holmes" series, starring Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce; his classic horror score for Son of Frankenstein (1939); his gentle, romantic themes for Written on the Wind (1956), Imitation of Life (1959) and Back Street (1961); and his effective, haunting arrangement of the American folk song "Oh Shenandoah", which is featured throughout the sprawling Civil War drama Shenandoah (1965). Skinner authored several more textbooks on orchestration theory. His manual "Underscore" (published 1950) was the first of its kind to detail techniques of orchestrating and composing for films.