Home

Gil Mellé

(On Topic: | Alan Tew | Boots For Dancing | Boy George | Cliff Richard | David Soul | Ennio Morricone | Geoff Love | George Michael | Gil Melle | Hugo Montenegro | Itai Itai | Jerry Goldsmith | Michael Caulfield | Paul Lekakis | Ray Davies | Screaming Mee Mees | Serge Gainsbourg | Syd Dale | Televisions Music Men | Tom Jones | Wendy Carlos | Index )

Bio

b. 31st December 1931, New York, New York, USA
d. 28th October 2004, Malibu, California, USA (heart attack)

The following comes from his no longer functioning website.

Born in 1931 in Jersey City, New Jersey, Gil Mellé displayed an early, precocious talent for art in all its forms. A winner of several national painting competitions while still in his teens, Mellé was also playing the jazz clubs of Greenwich Village before he was old enough to drive.

An aggressive innovator, Gil Mellé was constantly searching for new means of expression---in painting he was one of the first artists to incorporate collaged pieces of glass, metal, plastic and computer cards into his pictures, and he produced several record covers for Blue note records; in music, he is credited with introducing electronic instruments into jazz. When synthesizers were not available commercially, Mellé built them from scratch, and played the tenth Monterey Jazz Festival with the world's first all-electronic jazz group, "Gil Mellé and the Electronauts."

Relocating to Los Angeles over thirty years ago, Mellé continued his dual careers as professional painter and musician. His fame was the result of successful accomplishments in the field of motion pictures; Mellé wrote scores for over 125 movies. A member of the small pantheon of professional composers whose services were always in demand, Mellé was able to pick and choose his projects. For much of his last ten years, he declined most offers to devote his full attention to the visual arts.

On a computer that he built himself, Gil Mellé applied his intuitive command of harmony, balance and structure to the creation of digital paintings, or "e-paintings". This is an entirely new form of art, absolutely true to the times in which we live. Not computer-generated, this art was artist-generated, using the computer as a tool. Mellé's vast experience lent a rare integrity to these mostly traditional images, and his life-long experience as a serious and professional painter maked him uniquely prepared to fully utilize this revolutionary medium.

A passionate microscopist and open-cockpit pilot, Gil Mellé absorbed visions of the natural world that greatly increased his inner library of forms and colors. Mellé's expertise extended even to physical structures, having designed and built additions to his Malibu home, as well as working fountains, monumental sculptures, cast-iron gates and intricate leaded-glass windows.

These pictures, which Gil Mellé described as "Cybercloissonism, (referring both to the computer he used as a tool and to the effect of the light transmitted through his colors) were typically output one at a time as digital tranparencies (it could take weeks for a single perfect output and no two are alike) and were then mounted in light box enclosures of exotic hardwoods and stainless steel. The enclosures were designed and constructed by the artist, by hand, utilizing the finest materials available. Like the antique motor-cars that he collected, these artworks were built to last, with color integrity guaranteed for 200 years, and illumination systems that will shine for thousands of hours without ever changing a bulb.

Film Scores

  • Hot Target (with the New Zeland Symphony Orchestra )
  • The Andromeda Strain (The first synthesizer score ever written for a movie, 1969)
  • The Sentinel
  • The Savage is Loose
  • You'll like my Mother
  • The Organization
  • The Last Chase (with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra)
  • Embryo
  • Blood Beach (A Sydney Beckerman Production )
  • Borderline
  • B. J. Lang Presents...
  • Bone
  • The Ultimate Warrior
  • The Starship Invasion (with Christopher Lee )
  • Veronica Claire (a Lifetime Production )
  • Fire
  • Good Cop, Bad Cop
  • So Proudly We Hail
  • The Taking of Flight 847: The Ule Dikerson Story
  • Stillwatch
  • The Deliberate Stranger
  • A Family of Strangers
  • When Dreams Come True
  • Starcrossed
  • Fatal Vision (
  • Flight 90: Disaster on the Potomac
  • Jealousy )
  • Hollywood's Unsolved Mysteries
  • For Love of a Soldier
  • Voyeurs aka Through Naket Eyes
  • World War III
  • The Inttruder Within
  • Rape and marriage; The Rideout Case
  • Frankenstein: The True Story (with London Symphony Orchestra )
  • Attica (ABC Circle Entertainment Production )
  • That Certain Summer
  • My Sweet Charlie (from the David Westheimer Play )
  • The President's Plane is Missing
  • The Golden Mask of Tutankhamun (with The London Symphony Orchestra )
  • A Vacation in Hell
  • Gold of the Amazon Women
  • Perilous Voyage (The first television movie ever to use synthesizers)
  • Legend in Granite (The Vince Lombardi Story )
  • The Deadly are Missing
  • Killdozer
  • Hichhike
  • If Tomorrow Comes
  • Lieutenant Schuster's Wife
  • The Victim
  • Trapped
  • A Cold Night's Death
  • A Cry for Help (
  • The Six Million Dollar Man (Movie Version )
  • Death Scream
  • The Judge & Jake Wyler
  • Crime Club
  • The Imposter
  • Dynasty
  • The Questor Tapes
  • The Savage Report
  • Partners in Crime
  • Evel Knievel
  • Roman Gray )
  • The Last Angry Man
  • The Psychiatrist
  • Tenafly
  • Lawman without a Gun

Discography

78 RPMs

"The Gears"/"Four Moons" Blue Note

"Mars"/"Sunset Concerto" Blue Note

10'' LPs

"Gil Mellé Quintet/Sextet---New Faces/New Sounds"
with Max Roach, George Wallington, Red Mitchell,
Eddie Bert
Blue Note 5020

"Gil Mellé Quintet"
with Urbie Green, Tal Farlow, Joe Morello
Blue Note 5033

"Gil Mellé Quartet"
Blue Note 5054

"5 Impressions of Color"
with Don Butterfield, Tuba
Blue Note 5063

12'' LPs

"Patterns in Jazz"
with Oscar Pettiford, Eddie Bert, Ed Thigpen
Blue Note 1517

"Primitive Modern"
with Bill Phillips, Joe Cinderella, Ed Thigpen
Prestige 7040

"Gil's Guests"
with Kenny Dorham, Art Farmer, Juliuw Watkins, Don Butterfield, Hal McKusick
Prestige 7063

"Quadrama"
with George Duvivier, Shadow Wilson
Prestige 7097

"Tome VI"
(The first all-electronic jazz album ever recorded, 1968 )
with Forrest Westbrook, Ben Matthews, Fred Stofflet
Verve Records

"Waterbirds"
with Pete Robinson, Dave Parlato, Fred Stfflet
Nocturne Records

"The Andromeda Strain"
Universal Pictures Recordings

"Mindscape"
Solo electronic performance
Blue Note 92168

NOTE: Another album was recorded for Prestige Records but unreleased until recently on the CD reissue of "Gill's Guests" by Fantacy Records. A correction should be noted here regarding Fantacy's liner notes. Phil Woods is listed as being on alto saxophone but in reality it was Zoot Sims on Tenor Sax. This record also features Teddy Charles and Art Farmer.