Twin Peaks and Christmas Vacation Composer Angelo Badalamenti Dies

Angelo Badalamenti, an award-winning film composer best known for his collaborations with Twin Peaks creator David Lynch, has died. He was 85 years old. Badalamenti’s other collaborations with Lynch include his work scoring The Straight Story, Mulholland Drive, and Blue Velvet. Apart from Lynch, the composer created a number of memorable scores, including music for A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: The Dream Warriors and National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.  Born in Brooklyn in 1937, Badalamenti earned a Masters Degree from the Manhattan School of Music in 1959.

His film career in earnest started on the 1973 film Gordon’s War, but it wasn’t until working on Blue Velvet that he made film and TV scoring his primary career. Brought on as a voice coach for Isabella Rosselini, Badalamenti ended up writing an original song, “Mysteries of Love,” with Lynch for use in the film. He also appeared onscreen as the piano player accompanying her on the song, and it marked his first collaboration with singer Julee Cruse, who performed the vocals. Cruse, who also performed on Twin Peaks, passed away in June.

Badalamenti came on board Twin Peaks, writing the Grammy-winning theme song for the series and providing the score for not just both seasons of the show, but the feature film Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me and its Showtime revival in 2017.

His decades-long collaboration with Lynch put Badalamenti on screen at least one more time — as a gangster in Mulholland Drive. Whether his fixation on espresso is a nod to the “damn good coffee” in Twin Peaks is anybody’s guess.

Lynch briefly acknowledged the loss of his friend and collaborator during his daily Weather Report video, announcing on Monday, “Today — no music.”

In between scoring most of Lynch’s post-Blue Velvet work, Badalamenti worked on other films, TV shows, and ad campaigns, including scoring iconic ad campaigns for Adidas and Calvin Klein. He composed the opening theme for the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona, and other ’90s and early 2000s movies like Arlington Road (with Tim Robbins and Jeff Bridges), The Beach (with Leonardo DiCaprio), and Secretary (with Maggie Gyllenhaal).

Badalamenti received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the World Soundtrack Awards’s Academy in 2008, and the Henry Mancini Award from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers in 2011.