The maestro of movie scores and The Magic Disco Machine
FAST FACTS:
- First hit: “Midnight Rhapsody”
- Biggest hit: “Midnight Rhapsody”
- Top album: Motown Magic Disco Machine Vol. II
- Career highlight: Movie soundtrack for The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings
- William Goldstein begins working in the New York theatre field in the 1960s, scoring such productions as The Waters of Babylon and Mr. Tambo, Mr. Bones and A Bullet for Billy The Kid, a folk opera produced by CBS television. He is brought to Motown in 1975 when Berry Gordy hears his theme for ABC-TV’s weekday morning show, AM America. Goldstein’s “Spirit of ’76 (AM America)” is released as a Motown single.
- The 1976 Motown/Pan Arts movie, The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings, is scored by Goldstein, with songs by Berry Gordy, Jobete writer Ron Miller & Goldstein. The baseball comedy stars Billy Dee Williams, Richard Pryor and James Earl Jones, and is executive produced by Berry Gordy. Goldstein and Miller produce “The Bingo Long Song”, by Gordy & Miller. For Thelma Houston, Goldstein and Miller write and produce “Razzle Dazzle” and “One Out Of Every Six.” The latter is featured in the MGM movie Norman…Is That You? for which the pair also creates “An Old-Fashioned Man” by Smokey Robinson, released in late 1976.
- During this period, Motown launches a series of albums aimed at the flourishing disco market, including Disc-O-Tech by The Magic Disco Machine. This features material by various writers, producers and artists, including Gloria Jones, Freddie Perren, Hal Davis, the Sisters Love and the Devastating Affair. In the summer of ’76, The Magic Disco Machine Vol. II yields a disco hit written, produced and performed by Goldstein, “Midnight Rhapsody.” The LP contains other Goldstein tracks, including “Back To Bach.”
- That same year, he produces Motown’s cast recording for the first Broadway revival of Guys And Dolls, which stars Robert Guillaume as Nathan Detroit. The album is nominated for a Grammy® award.
- Goldstein goes on to score a dozen more feature films; 25 films for TV; several documentaries and mini-series, including oceanQuest, for which he creates the first computer-sequenced direct to digital score; and, among others, the TV series Fame, for which he receives an Emmy® nomination. The musician is known today for his improvised “instant compositions,” while his Motown tenure is chronicled in 2009’s The Best Of William Goldstein, including “Midnight Rhapsody” and the above-mentioned tracks by Thelma Houston and Smokey Robinson.
