Media Music and the Composers Who Shaped Mexico's Movie Soundtracks

If you’ve ever visited a repertoire theater in your city, chances are you’ve seen a film snipe of “OUR FEATURE PRESENTATION” right before the film unspooled on screen. And if you’ve seen that snipe, you’ve probably heard a funky tune playing with it. And if you’re anything like me the first time I heard it around 25 years ago, you’ve thought to yourself “what song is this?” There was a time when quick jingles like this were nameless and the composers were essentially ghosts. Internet forums quickly changed that and we all learned that that jingle was called ‘Funky Fanfare’ on the record titled Beat Incidental (KPM 1043) by Keith Mansfield released on England’s KPM Music record label; a music library dedicated to licensing music to films, tv shows, ads, and anything else you can imagine. However, England wasn’t the only country to make such music. France, Italy, and Germany all had great musicians release library music through various labels. Right here in the US we had labels like Robert Hall Productions, NFL Music Library, Major Records, and Media Music, just to name a few, which all lent their music to films and television here and also in Mexico.

Composers such as Jack Mayhorn, Neil Amsterdam, Tom Elliot, Henrik Nielsen, and Jan Kimberly all recorded music for the Capitol Records owned production library, Media Music; music that would be chosen for films by directors such as Ruben Galindo, Pedro Galindo III, Adolfo Martinez Solares, Jesús Marín, and Alfredo Gurrola. But what if I told you that Jack Mayhorn, Neil Amsterdam, Tom Elliot, Henrik Nielsen, and Jan Kimberly were all the same person? That’s right, one man composed and recorded tons of music cues (not all) that would become synonymous with Mexican cult cinema. That man is none other than Ole Georg. Ole Georg, like virtually every library musician/composer, released music under various names to separate the name from the music, to be able to release music on different record labels, or simply because one person being attached to every release might jeopardize the mystique of a label and all its “artists”.

Born in Denmark, Ole Georg was a violinist and an arranger who took over Capitol Production Music in the early 60’s which would eventually lead to the creation of the Media Music Series. While most movie scores are big compositions played by large orchestras with different conductors, library music was genre-less by design to fit blindly with any situation, any movie, any commercial and were usually recorded fast and cheap with the same players across many volumes of series. Never intended for private consumption, the records were pressed in limited quantities and given to studios, most likely discarded once deemed useless. On the front cover, you’d see simple image that was featured on the entire series with a slight variation to differentiate which release number it was. On the back of the record sleeves, you would generally have a track listing that had a runtime as well as space for you to write a notes on which songs directors would eventually select for their movies; sometimes a small description of the composition would accompany the track list for easy selections.

Often times the records that were used in movies were reissued by sister labels such as Media Music The Professional & Hi-“Q” Series which are all under the umbrella of Media Music, making these limited pressed records even harder to find and the stories behind them more convoluted. Trying to find which songs were used is like finding a needle in a haystack; thankfully the internet and fans of library music started doing the work of uncovering these music gems that Mexican film fans have grown to know and love. As my personal collection of Media Music has grown and I’ve uncovered more movies and shows that used these libraries, I want to start a series where I’ll dive deep into specific records, some of which are featured on historic television broadcasts like Chavo del Ocho; others were used in action films, sci fi films or even horror films from directors I mentioned above. We’ll start the series with a entry next month on a record that has been featured in at least seven different movies (that I know of at least) that was composed by one of Europes most regarded library composer… Roger Webb.