The film composer John Barry — whose music for the James Bond films helped to define the Swinging Sixties — has died. He was seventy seven and suffered a heart attack.
Born in York, Barry was schooled in church music as a child, started a successful pop group and began writing film scores in 1960.
His compositions included Born Free, The Lion in Winter, Midnight Cowboy, Dances With Wolves and eleven Bond films; he didn’t compose the theme tune of the movie franchise, but he did arrange it.
Barry went on to win five Oscars, as well as a number of Golden Globes, Grammies and BAFTAs. He was made a fellow of the British Film Academy in 2005.
With more than ninety scores to his name, he once said that when he looked back on his life, he wondered “How the hell did I do all of this?”