Steven C. Smith

Steven C. Smith is an Emmy-nominated documentary producer, author, and speaker who specializes in Hollywood history and profiles of contemporary filmmakers.

He is the author of two acclaimed biographies: Music by Max Steiner: The Epic Life of Hollywood’s Most Influential Composer (Oxford University Press), and A Heart at Fire’s Center: The Life and Music of Bernard Herrmann (University of California Press). Both books received the ASCAP Foundation Deems Taylor Award, and the Herrmann biography was the main research source for the Academy Award-nominated documentary Music for the Movies: Bernard Herrmann.

A four-time Emmy nominee and sixteen-time Telly Award winner, Steven has produced and written over 200 documentaries. They include The Sound of a City: Julie Andrews Returns to Salzburg; The Lure of the Desert: Martin Scorsese on Lawrence of Arabia; A Place for Us: West Side Story’s Legacy; and Thou Shalt Not: Sex, Sin and Censorship in Pre-Code Hollywood.

book cover photo of Max Steiner

Music by Max Steiner:

The Epic Life of Hollywood’s Most Influential Composer

During a seven-decade career that spanned from 19th century Vienna to 1920s Broadway to the golden age of Hollywood, three-time Academy Award winner Max Steiner did more than any other composer to establish the language of film music, while writing many of cinema’s most memorable scores.

Also by Steven C. Smith:

A Heart at Fire's Center:

The Life and Music of Bernard Herrmann

No composer contributed more to film than Oscar winner Bernard Herrmann, who in over 40 scores enriched the work of such directors as Orson Welles, Alfred Hitchcock, François Truffaut, and Martin Scorsese.
book cover Bernard Herrmann
book cover Bernard Herrmann

A Heart at Fire's Center:

The Life and Music of Bernard Herrmann

No composer contributed more to film than Oscar winner Bernard Herrmann, who in over 40 scores enriched the work of such directors as Orson Welles, Alfred Hitchcock, François Truffaut, and Martin Scorsese.

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