Worldwide influence: Oklahomans pay homage to Italian film composer Ennio Morricone

For Tahlequah singer, songwriter and fiddler Kyle Nix, it was little surprise that the singular Spaghetti Western sounds created by iconic film composer Ennio Morricone influenced his new solo album.

Those sounds have been inspiring him since childhood.

"When I was younger, I think my first memories of it were hearing those sounds from my grandpa's TV when he was watching a Western. It just kind of ingrained itself in me that, 'OK, when a story's being told, that's the sound that comes through,'" Nix said in a recent interview. "I think being that these were story-songs ... I wanted to put all the stories together with sounds that I associated with stories. They might have been behind pictures on the screen, but if I could maybe sew that thread through all these songs, maybe I could make some sense of that and make it a front and back cover to all these story-songs."

The Italian maestro's influence on the Perry native's 17-song collection "Lightning on the Mountain & Other Short Stories" is just a small indication of how Morricone shaped the cinematic sounds beloved by film and music lovers around the world.

Morricone died Monday at the age of 91.

According to the Associated Press, Morricone’s longtime lawyer, Giorgio Assumma, said “the Maestro" died in a Rome hospital of complications following surgery after a recent fall in which he broke a leg bone.

Over his 60-year career, Morricone produced more than 400 original scores for a wide range of films, including the gangster epic “The Untouchables” by Brian de Palma, the creature feature "The Thing" by John Carpenter and the period drama "The Mission" by Roland Joffe.

Oklahoma City Philharmonic Music Director Alexander Mickelthwate included the theme “Gabriel’s Oboe” from the Oscar-nominated "The Mission" score last fall in his Classics program "Italian Gems," reasoning any program with that name and theme just had to include a Morricone selection.

"It just gives that sense of Morricone, that most famous Italian composer," Micklethwate said in autumn. "It was just a little gem for me."

Morricone was best known for his inventive and influential Spaghetti Western scores, transforming the sounds of the genre through his partnership with his countryman and former classmate, the late filmmaker Sergio Leone. Their collaborations included the “Dollars” trilogy starring Clint Eastwood as "The Man with No Name": “A Fistful of Dollars” in 1964, “For a Few Dollars More” in 1965 and the legendary “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” in 1966.

It wasn't the last time Morricone would work with either Leone or Eastwood: His use of the miniature pan flute on Leone’s 1984 movie “Once Upon A Time in America" also became iconic.

"The soundtrack to 'Two Mules for Sister Sarah' is one of the most memorable and innovative I can think of for its time," said Oklahoma City sculptor Hugh Meade, referring to Don Siegel's 1970 Western starring Eastwood and Shirley MacLaine.

Morricone won the for lifetime achievement in 2007, but the prolific composer kept working. In 2016, he received his sixth Academy Award nod — and finally a win — for his distinctive work on Quentin Tarantino's snowbound epic "The Hateful Eight."

The Rome native received his first Oscar nomination for original score with “Days Of Heaven,” a 1978 movie by Terence Malick, who grew up in Bartlesville. Along with "The Hateful Eight" and "The Mission," he also earned Oscar nods for “The Untouchables” (1987), “Bugsy” (1991) and “Malena” (2000).

Peter Dolese, executive director of the Arts Council Oklahoma City, said Morricone created "timeless anthems for the ages."

"His music will always remain fresh and meaningful," Dolese said.