Ernest Gold was born in Vienna, Austria, on July 13, 1921. He began to study music at the age of six and went on to study at the State Academy of Music. When Hitler invaded Austria in 1938, Gold left for the United States, where he worked first as a piano accompanist and later as a songwriter of popular tunes in New York. Eventually he arrived in Hollywood, where he was quickly put to work as a composer for Columbia Pictures in 1945. Gold endured the assembly-line production of numerous B-movies until achieving acclaim with his score for Stanley Kramer’s ON THE BEACH in 1959. The following year, Gold earned world-wide fame as the composer for Otto Preminger’s EXODUS, for which he won the Academy Award for best score, in addition to two Grammy Awards, for best soundtrack album and best song. In addition to composing for the screen, Gold has also served as the musical director for the Santa Barbara Symphony, conducted his own concert music, such as the acclaimed ‘Symphony for Five Instruments’ (1952; recorded i