Danny Elfman

Drawing from inspirations such as Harry Partch, Kurt Weill, Sergei Prokofiev, Igor Stravinsky, and Cab Calloway, the adaptable screen composer Danny Elfman earned widespread recognition for his imaginative partnerships with filmmaker Tim Burton. He launched his scoring efforts on the 1980 musical fantasy comedy Forbidden Zone before assembling one of the era’s most recognizable bodies of contemporary motion-picture music, applying his abilities to a shadowy fantasy universe inhabited by superheroes in Justice League, creatures in Hellboy: The Golden Army, and eccentrics in Edward Scissorhands. A onetime street-theater performer, he simultaneously directed the new-wave outfit Oingo Boingo, whose broad fusion of pop, ska, rock, and global sounds lasted seventeen years and produced the mid-1980s successes “Dead Man’s Party” and “Weird Science.” In 1990 Elfman received an Emmy nomination for the signature main theme of The Simpsons while capturing a Grammy for Best Instrumental Composition for the main title of Burton’s Batman. He next earned a Golden Globe nomination for the 1993 project The Nightmare Before Christmas, an expansive blend of classical, stage-musical, and pop elements in which Elfman supplied the singing voice of the central character Jack Skellington, before Oingo Boingo delivered its seventh and last album, Boingo, in 1994. Academy Award nominations subsequently arrived for his 1997 scores to Men in Black and Good Will Hunting. Although he maintained his association with Burton well into the 2010s on titles such as Big Fish, his third Oscar-nominated effort, Alice in Wonderland, and Dumbo, Elfman demonstrated equal skill with more grounded material, collecting praise for scores created with David O. Russell on Silver Linings Playbook and American Hustle and with Gus Van Sant on the Oscar-nominated Milk and Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot. Composed entirely during pandemic lockdown, a circumstance mirrored in its tense orchestral hard-rock textures, the 2021 album Big Mess constituted Elfman’s first solo pop release in nearly forty years.

Born May 29, 1953, in Los Angeles to novelist Blossom Elfman and her husband Milton, he and sibling Richard moved to France in 1971 and joined an experimental theatrical ensemble. Elfman later journeyed through Africa, performing on the streets and gathering West African percussion instruments, until malaria prompted his return to the United States. He then rejoined Richard in the Jazz Age–styled performance-art collective Mystic Knights of Oingo Boingo, serving as its musical director. Richard later helmed the 1980 film Forbidden Zone, drawn from the troupe, and commissioned his brother to write the score. Prior to the picture’s release, Danny assumed lead vocal and songwriting duties for Mystic Knights, reduced the ensemble to eight members, and shortened the name to Oingo Boingo; the band cultivated a devoted cult audience. Its opening three albums—Only a Lad (1981), Nothing to Fear (1982), and Good for Your Soul (1983)—each reached the lower half of the Billboard 200. Elfman issued the solo pop album So-Lo with modest notice in 1984; guitarist Steve Bartek, an Oingo Boingo colleague and frequent orchestrator of Elfman scores, contributed to the record.

During 1985 Oingo Boingo released Dead Man’s Party, which included the Top 50 single and film theme “Weird Science,” and Elfman encountered emerging director Tim Burton. Following their initial success on Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure (1985), the pair collaborated repeatedly, with Elfman providing music for Burton works such as Beetlejuice (1988), the Grammy-winning Batman (1989), Edward Scissorhands (1990), and Batman Returns (1992). Elfman also scored the Burton-produced Nightmare Before Christmas in 1993, supplying the singing voice of animated lead Jack Skellington; the album earned a Golden Globe nomination for best score and a Grammy nomination for Best Musical Album for Children. One year later Oingo Boingo issued its seventh album Boingo before disbanding in 1995. Darker in tone than prior releases, it attained the group’s highest chart placement at number 71 on the U.S. album list. The decade further yielded Burton pairings on Mars Attacks! (1996) and Sleepy Hollow (1999). Beyond Tim Burton’s orbit, Elfman scored additional features throughout the 1980s and 1990s, many of them unusual tales such as Darkman, Dick Tracy, and The Frighteners. His 1997 scores for the independent drama Good Will Hunting and the summer blockbuster Men in Black secured his initial Academy Award nominations. Television contributions encompassed the Emmy-nominated Simpsons theme and the Emmy-winning Desperate Housewives theme.

Alongside his 2003 marriage to actress Bridget Fonda, the new millennium delivered ongoing professional recognition. Further Burton projects included the Best Original Score nominee Big Fish (2003) and the animated Corpse Bride (2005). Elfman also released the Sony Classical symphony Serenada Schizophrana in 2006 and received his fourth Academy Award nomination for Gus Van Sant’s 2008 Harvey Milk biopic Milk. Prominent entries from his extensive 2010s output encompass Burton’s 2010 Alice in Wonderland, the 2012 comedy-drama Silver Linings Playbook, and 2013’s American Hustle, the latter two directed by David O. Russell. The single year 2015 brought the contrasting Elfman scores Fifty Shades of Grey, Avengers: Age of Ultron, and Goosebumps. The 2016 follow-up Alice Through the Looking Glass represented the composer’s seventeenth Tim Burton feature. That same year Sony Classical issued his original ballet music for Rabbit & Rogue, premiered at the Metropolitan Opera House in 2008, together with the score for thriller The Girl on the Train. The next year he supplied music for high-profile releases including Fifty Shades Darker and Justice League, the latter reaching the Billboard 200. In 2018 he rejoined Gus Van Sant for the comedy-drama Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot. His score for Tim Burton’s live-action Walt Disney adaptation Dumbo reached theaters in 2019. Also that year the Men in Black series returned with Men in Black: International carrying an Elfman score, and the composer collaborated once more with his brother on Richard Elfman’s Aliens, Clowns & Geeks.

After delivering music for the fantasy film Dolittle in January 2020, Elfman had scheduled a series of retrospective concert performances. With worldwide tours canceled amid the COVID-19 pandemic, he instead wrote and recorded his first solo pop-rock album since 1984’s So-Lo. The unforeseen and uneasy Big Mess appeared on Anti- and Epitaph in June 2021. The postponed thriller The Woman in the Window, featuring an Elfman score, likewise surfaced in 2021. The subsequent year brought his soundtrack for Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. 2022 additionally saw the appearance of Bigger. Messier., a companion release to 2021’s Big Mess containing inventive remixes by Iggy Pop, Xiu Xiu, and Trent Reznor, among others.