Ian Fraser | Arranger, composer, 81
Emmy-winning music conductor, arranger, and composer Ian Fraser, 81, who worked extensively with Julie Andrews and oversaw a famed Bing Crosby/David Bowie holiday duet, died at home in Los Angeles on Friday. The cause was cancer, said his daughter, Tiffany Fraser.
Emmy-winning music conductor, arranger, and composer Ian Fraser, 81, who worked extensively with Julie Andrews and oversaw a famed Bing Crosby/David Bowie holiday duet, died at home in Los Angeles on Friday. The cause was cancer, said his daughter, Tiffany Fraser.
Mr. Fraser was the arranger and conductor on numerous television shows during the golden age of musical specials in the 1960s and '70s, winning the first of his 11 Emmys for the 1976 America Salutes Richard Rodgers show that aired on CBS.
The unlikely Crosby/Bowie duet was performed on the 1977 Bing Crosby's Merrie Olde Christmas program, also on CBS, on which Mr. Fraser was the music director and Bowie a guest star.
His closest collaboration was with Andrews, beginning in the early 1970s when her husband, director Blake Edwards, also wanted him for a project. Mr. Fraser had to choose.
"Julie is Julie, so that's who he went with," Tiffany Fraser said. - L.A. Times