If Martin Scorsese finally wins Best Director this weekend, he won't be the only
Italian maestro to receive a long overdue Academy Award. Composer Ennio
Morricone will also receive an honorary Oscar for a lifetime of incredible music.
His amazing scores include The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, Once Upon a Time in
the West, 1900, Cinema Paradiso, The Mission, and The Untouchables, among many,
many more.

Besides his honorary Oscar, there's been a critical mass of Morricone tributes
as of late, including his first ever American appearance at Radio City Music
Hall where he conducted some of his greatest scores. Six films he scored also
recently played at the Museum of Modern Art, and twenty-six films he scored
recently played at the Film Forum in New York. Metallica have opened their
concerts with "The Ecstasy of Gold," from The Good, the Bad, the Ugly, since
1983, and their cover of "Gold" will be on the tribute album, We All Love Ennio
Morricone.

Morricone has scored hundreds of films, his entire filmography on imdb.com
prints out to 28 pages, but he recently told the New York Times, "compared to
Classical composers like Bach, Frescobaldi, Palestrina or Mozart, I would define
myself as unemployed." As the Times reported, he doesn't compose at the piano,
but goes straight from his brain to the scoring page when he writes. One can
only imagine how incredible a tour of his brain would sound.

Yet Morricone remains modest about his accomplishments, calling the art form
he's generously contributed to "the strange miracle of music" in the Wall Street
Journal. Like Sergio Leone, who worked hand in hand with Morricone, Ennio wasn't
afraid to experiment and break the rules. James Hetfield of Metallica told the
New York Times, "He has taken so many risks, and his music is not polished
whatsoever. It's very rude and blatant...There's so much character in it, and I
appreciate that in such a polished world of soundtracks." What can we add except,
Bravo Ennio, Bravo.

THE SET LIST FROM MORRICONE'S RADIO CITY MUSIC HALL PERFORMANCE:

"LA VITTA E LA LEGGENDA"
THE UNTOUCHABLES
ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA
Deborah's Theme - Poverty - Once Upon a Time in America
The Legend of 1900

NUOVA CINEMA PARADISO

MALENA

"THE MODERNITY OF MYTH IN SERGIO LEONE'S CINEMA"
THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY
ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST
A FISTFUL OF DYNAMITE
THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY - "THE ECSTASY OF THE GOLD"

"SOCIAL CINEMA"
VITTIME DI GUERRA
ABOLISSON from QUEMADA

"SCATTERED SHEETS"
H2 S
IL CLAN DEI SICILIANI (from THE SICILIAN CLAN)
METTI UNA SERA A CENA
UNO CHE GRITA AMORE from Metti Una Sera a Cena (from CHE!)
COME MADALENA

THE MISSION
GABRIEL'S OBOE
MISSION
IN EARTH AS IN HEAVEN

Set List Courtesy of Chris Poggoli.