From:   "Dik de Heer" 
Date:  Sun Jun 15, 2003  2:02 am
Subject:  Born To Be With You : David Rose

DAVID ROSE

Born 15 June 1910, London, England
Died 23 August 1990, Burbank, California

Conductor / composer / arranger.

Orchestra leader David Rose deserves a place here for "The Stripper",
a brilliant piece of burlesque, that went all the way to # 1 in mid-1962. 
The song, written by Rose himself, had been recorded four years earlier,
when there were ten minutes of studio time left after the recording of a 
string album. When Rose was asked by MGM in 1962 to quickly record 
a new version of "Ebb Tide" to help promote the MGM film "Sweet Bird 
of Youth", there was no time to record a B-side and someone at MGM 
pulled an obscure, untitled, unreleased cut from the master files for the
flip. That became "The Stripper". The accompanying album, "The Stripper
and Other Fun Songs for the Family", was also a hit, peaking at # 3. 
Though David Rose released over 50 albums throughout his career, no
other LP of his reached the charts.

Born in London, Rose and his family moved to the United States when he 
was four years old. He attended the Chicago College of Music and went
to work for NBC Radio in Chicago as a pianist and arranger.

In 1941, MGM Studios hired Rose as a musical director. At MGM, he wrote
scores for films starring Doris Day, Don Ameche, Esther Williams, Dorothy
Lamour, and Martha Raye, his first wife (his second wife was Judy Garland,
1941-45). In 1944 he scored a million seller with his self-composed "Holiday
For Strings". (Personally I prefer the hilarious Spike Jones version, recorded
in November 1944, the month in which I was born.) 

In the 1950s Rose became a prolific composer of television theme songs 
and at one time there were 22 series on the air with his music. He won an
Emmy for the music he wrote for "Bonanza". 

In the late '50s, Rose began releasing albums, which alternated between
collections of show tunes, film themes and mood music. He also dabbled 
with Calypso, which resulted in a minor hit single, "Calypso Melody," in 1957.
Rose also arranged and provided accompaniment for pop hits, most notably
Connie Francis' 1959 single "My Happiness".

During the '70s, he composed the music for Little House on the Prairie, which
was nearly as well-received as his scores for Bonanza. A 1975 episode of 
that program marked Rose's 1000th television score.

Rose also conducted a number of symphony concerts during the decade, 
as well as recording the occasional album. Though his activity slowed 
considerably in the '80s, he still released a handful of albums and performed 
a couple of concerts. David Rose died of heart failure in 1990.