简介：影视原声创作家。 Michael A. Levine is currently best known as the composer for the hit series Cold Case, and recently for the CBS drama Close To Home. But did you know that he also wrote the music for the well-loved (and loathed...see below) Kit Kat "Gimme A Break" jingle? As well as being a respected composer of concert music whose pieces include his "Divination By Mirrors: Concerto for Musical Saw and Strings" and "Concerto for Pedal Steel Guitar and Orchestra"? Michael had a career he describes as "pathologically eclectic". Born in Tokyo, raised in the Midwest, schooled in Canada (McGill Univ.), Wisconsin (UW), and Boston (Berklee College of Music), Michael moved to New York City where his first job was playing violin on the streets. By the mid-80s, Michael had become a well-known studio musician, more often hired as a keyboard player than violinist because of his expertise in sampling and synthesis. (He was the only white guy on the Grandmaster Flash`s seminal rap hit "Larry`s Dance Theme".) Artists who he recorded with included proto hip-hop act Mtume; pop stars Boy George, Joe Jackson, and (later) Lenny Kravitz; English avant-garde musicians John Greaves and Peter Blegvad; and jazz musicians Dave Grusin and Carla Bley. Michael became in demand as an improvising string player after performing the violin solo on Marianne Faithfull`s noirish version of "Boulevard of Broken Dreams" produced by Hal Wilner. Eventually, Michael began writing music for advertising and, with his wife Claire Nelson, founded a music and sound design production company, Michael Levine Music. Michael`s entre into advertising proved to be his ground-breaking combination of high-tech sound design with music. His classic work for Mitsubishi Eclipse which combined Japanese flute, an operatic soprano, world percussion, and electronically processed animal noises won him the first of two Clio awards. The then-radical approach Michael used on the Mitsubishi spots became so widely imitated by others in car commercials that the formula eventually became an advertising cliché. Still, his best-known ads are his jingles: "Wacky Wild Kool-Aid Style," "Motts and Motts of Motts," and, most (in)famously, "Gimme a Break" (for Kit Kat). [A study by Univ. of Cincinnati researcher James Kellaris in 2003 compiled a list of the most notorious so-called earworms. Earworms are those little bits of music that you can't get out of your head - whether you want to or not. Michael is proud to report that "Gimme a Break" was ranked in the Top 10 along with "We Will Rock You" and "YMCA".] In 1995, Michael embarked on a new career when director Keith Thomson asked him to score a short film called Cupidity. Shot in a day on leftover film stock, the no-budget comedy became an award-winning hit after premiering at the Sundance Film Festival. Besides his TV and independent film work, Levine has served as support composer for Hans Zimmer (Shark Tale, Matchstick Men), Harry Gregson-Williams (Shrek 2, Veronica Guerin), and Cliff Martinez (Wonderland, Wicker Park). Zimmer gave Michael's career a huge boost when he recommended him to director Vicky Jenson (co-directer of Shrek). Vicky asked Michael to score her film, Family Tree, which was featured at the Sundance Film Festival in January of 2003. Then, with Hans' endorsement, in the fall of 2003 Michael was asked to score the new CBS detective drama, Cold Case. Produced by the legendary Jerry Bruckheimer along with Warner Bros., Cold Case became the most watched new drama on television that fall and has remained a hit ever since. ASCAP awarded Michael its Film and Television Music Award for the show in 2004, and again in 2005, 2006 and 2007. In the fall of 2005, Michael was asked to score a second drama for Bruckheimer/Warners/CBS, Close To Home. In late 2006, Michael composed the score for Adrift In Manhattan, an independent feature film which premiered at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival in the dramatic competition. The film, which tell three intertwining stories of loss and redemption, stars Heather Graham and William Baldwin and was directed by Alfredo de Villa. The film is set to be released in the Fall of 2007. With jazz pianist Michael Wolff, Michael is works as song producer for the hit Nickelodeon show "The Naked Bros. Band". The show had the highest rated premiere on Nickelodeon in seven years in February, 2007. The show is a mockumentary about the world's greatest kids band, starring and featuring original songs by Alex and Nat Wolff. Michael hasn`t abandoned art music, either. His "Divination By Mirrors" - a concerto for musical saw and orchestra - had its west coast premiere in 2003, performed by San Francisco's New Century Chamber Orchestra (NCCO.org) with Dale Stuckenbruck as saw soloist. Michael's concerto for pedal steel guitar and orchestra was premiered by the Nashville Chamber Orchestra (NCO.org) in 2005 and featured steel guitar virtuoso Gary Morse. Michael is also working with William Phillip Mckinley on mounting a production of Orpheus Electronica, a multi-media techno-opera which sets the myth of Orpheus in an underground dance party. Mckinley directed the Broadway hit musical The Boy From Oz, starring Hugh Jackman, and was also director of the Ringling Bros. Circus.