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From our friends over at Variety comes the sad news today that Brooks Arthur passed away at the age of 86.
If you don’t know the name Brooks Arthur, then you certainly know the Grammy-winner’s steadfast musical contributions to the world of movies: As a key musical supervisor of his time, he oversaw the music behind such fan-favorite movies as The Karate Kid. Feel inspired every time you catch a gander of Daniel LaRusso doing the Crane-Kick on Johnny Lawrence during the final reel of director John Avildsen’s masterpiece of 190s cinema The Karate Kid? You owe that sense of inspiration, in part, to Brooks Arthur.
A native of Brooklyn known to all that loved him as Arnold Brosdky, the creative wunderkind soon changed his name and had high-flying dreams of becoming a popular crooner of his day before a stint in the mailroom at Decca Records changed his course and led him onto the path of becoming a respected audio engineer. The loss to the world of male vocalists was a huge gain for audiophiles and, later on, movie buffs: Arthur was integral in capturing the sound of legendary rocker Van Morrison and his seminal hit Brown Eyed Girl (for which he also provided his own backing vocals on). He worked with most of the big names on the music scene – Neil Diamond, the Grateful Dead, Peggy Lee – collecting a staggering twenty Grammy nominations and three coveted wins. But it’s appropriately in the arena of film where most people first recognized this unstoppable talent.
The Karate Kid, The Wedding Singer, Waterboy, Grown Ups (Arthur was a constant supporter and champion of Adam Sandler) as well as a deserved Oscar nomination for his contributions to the pop hit from The Karate Kid II, Glory of Love, all stand as a monument to the sheer talent Brooks Arthur possessed in spades.
Adam Sandler paid tribute to Arthur in a public statement today, saying that “Nobody like that man on the planet. Pure kindness. Loving. Giving. Creative. Patient. Soulful. Super human being. A true mensch. Engineered and produced some of the greatest songs of our time. Loved him like family.”
Not to be outdone, director Judd Apatow added, “The greatest, kindest man. Endlessly talented. His credits are stunning. Always in a great mood. When you saw him your day always got better and sunnier. Just the other day I saw a Robin Williams album and on the back it said produced by Brooks. He did so many remarkable things in his life. We went to see Van Morrison and he was so excited to see Brooks because he was the engineer on Astral Weeks! He was the ringleader of the most amazing comedy albums with Adam. And his warm spirit inspired a ton of characters and sketches. I will miss him so much. He made the world a much better place.”
Brooks Arthur left behind a wife of sixty-three years as well as two daughters; our condolences to the Arthur family, his friends and his fans. He will be missed by any of us that knows good music when we hear it.
