Professional Profile:
Steve Dorff, Composer,
Songwriter
"I always wanted to do
music for movies," says award-
winning composer Steve Dorff.
He began playing piano at age
four and was composing little
tunes soon after. While in
junior high school, he began
writing songs and formed a
rock and roll band, emulating
The Beatles.
To appease his parents, he
enrolled at the University of
Georgia, earning a degree in
journalism, but his real interest remained in songwriting. After gradua-
tion, he traveled between Atlanta and Nashville, trying to break into the
music business, finally landing his first songwriting contract with Lowry
Music in Atlanta. While he
dreamed of writing music for
films, it took about four and a
half years before he made the
move to California.
Arriving in Los Angeles in
1974 without any contacts and
just enough money to last for
two weeks, Dorff began
making the rounds. "I just
knocked on doors." A demo
tape he left for producer Snuff
Garrett resulted in an audition
and a contract for $250 per
week. Dorff cut his musical
teeth writing for five of Clint
Eastwood's movies (among
them, Every Which Way But
Loose and Bronco Billy), produc-
ing seven number-one hits in
a row.
In 1984, Dorff signed a co-
publishing deal with Warner
What do you like
least about your job?
"Having time on my
hands, when I'm not
busy. That's frustrating
for me."--Steve Dorff
What do you love most
about your job?
"I love being busy. I love the actual going
into the studio and recording with an orches-
tra, hearing, for the first time, those things
that I only heard in my head. When it works,
that's my favorite part."--Steve Dorff
VOICES OF
EXPERIENCE
"There are a lot of
people that have a gift,
but that don't have the
innate common sense
and the innate tenacity
that it takes to be successful over a long
period of time. Anybody can have a hit, but
to succeed over and over and over again, over
a 20 to 25 year period, requires that intangi-
ble thing that allows you to pick yourself up
and dust yourself off when you have bitter
disappointments."--Steve Dorff
"Stay grounded when you're having a
tremendous cycle of success. Always have a
couple of balls in the air at the same time. It's
hard when you've only got one thing that
you're doing--you finish it, and you have to
get something else going. It's easier to
always try and have something in the wings
waiting to segue to." –Steve Dorff
CAREER TIPS
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