Scott Dunn, pianist and associate conductor of the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, presents a recital featuring solo piano arrangements of music from classic mid-20th-century film scores—the blockbusters of “Hollywood’s Second Golden Age.” The program features music from Psycho (1960), To Kill a Mockingbird (1962), A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), Rebel Without a Cause (1955), East of Eden (1955), and more.

In the 1950s, classically trained composers like Leonard Rosenman (with whom Dunn studied informally), Alex North, Bernard Herrmann, Elmer Bernstein, and others created a new approach to film scoring that drew not only on their classical foundations but also from American jazz and works by new European and U.S. composers.

“The quality of the film music they produced has never been surpassed and is well worth presenting as absolute music,” says Dunn.

In 2016, the Los Angeles Philharmonic commissioned Dunn to adapt Rosenman’s score for Rebel Without a Cause for a “live-to-picture performance” with full orchestra. After the success of that performance and during the 2020 pandemic lockdown, Dunn adapted that arrangement to stand-alone concert suites for both orchestra and solo piano, and from there, created suites and arrangements for his favorite scores from the 1950s and ’60s.

Scott Dunn studied conducting with Jorge Mester, music director of the Aspen Music Festival and School from 1970 to 1990.