(Washington) The American composer Angelo Badalamenti, author of the languid soundtrack of the cult series Twin Peaks of David Lynch, died at the age of 85, according to American media on Monday.
His death, at his family home in New Jersey, was confirmed by his niece at New York Times and at HollywoodReporter.
Born in 1937 in New York, he studied classical music. In 1986, he began working with filmmaker David Lynch on the highly acclaimed blue-velvetcollaboration that he will continue on the feature film with Wild at Heart, Lost Highway and The Straight Story.
He will even play a gangster, facing the camera, in the thriller Mulholland Drive.
But his arguably best-known work with the American director is that around Twin Peaksa seminal television series from the early 1990s that revolutionized the genre.
Angelo Badalamenti writes a suspended theme, calm and sinister, in the image of this “disturbing strangeness” that David Lynch excels in creating in a small imaginary town bordered by giant pines in which telephones ring in the void.
“The notes arrived like that,” he told the magazine. Spirit and Flesh in 2015, recounting the creation of this soundtrack with the director.
“David was amazed, and so was I. He had his arm hair standing on end and was pulling a tear, saying “I see Twin Peaks, it’s good, I have it”, and I answered “I’ll go home, work on it”. “Rework it? Don’t change a note!” And of course I never changed anything.
Mr. Badalamenti has also composed music for Nina Simone, Shirley Bassey, David Bowie and Paul McCartney.