Early life

Giacchino was born in Riverside Township, New Jersey. His father's ancestors came from Sicily and his mother's ancestors immigrated from Abruzzo in Southern Italy; he holds dual American and Italian citizenship. Giacchino grew up in Edgewater Park Township, New Jersey and graduated in 1986 from Holy Cross High School in Delran Township, New Jersey.

Giacchino began combining images and music at age 10, when he began creating stop-motion animation with homemade soundtracks in his basement. While in high school, an art teacher who mentored Giacchino recommended to his parents that he attend the School of Visual Arts in New York City. Giacchino describes visiting the school with his parents thus:

I thought, wow, this is fantastic. They actually have colleges like this? Where I can do the things that I am really interested in doing? That was amazing to me. I loved SVA. I loved the kind of freedom that it provided. It was kind of like this great experiment—okay, you're here because you like something. So let's see how much you like it. We're not going to regulate you too much. We're going to see how passionate and driven you are, and how much you want this thing.

Giacchino enrolled at SVA, majoring in film production and minoring in history. During his final year at SVA, his instructor in film publicity announced an unpaid internship was available at Universal Pictures. Giacchino, who was the only one interested, obtained the six-month position, which he filled at night while attending school during the day and working at Macy's to pay his rent. He graduated from SVA in 1990 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts, after which he took music classes at the Juilliard School.

Career

Video games

When Giacchino's internship ended, Universal hired him, giving him a job upon graduation from college. He later moved to Disney, and when Disney relocated to Los Angeles, Giacchino moved with them, working in publicity, while taking night classes in instrumentation and orchestration at UCLA. His work for Disney had him interacting with the various personnel who worked in films, such as the producers who hired composers, so when a job at Disney Interactive opened for a producer, Giacchino obtained the job, thinking he could hire himself to write music for the games he produced.

Giacchino's composition work for Disney Interactive during the 16-bit era included the Sega Genesis game Gargoyles, the SNES game Maui Mallard in Cold Shadow and the various console versions of The Lion King. However his first major composition was for the DreamWorks video game adaptation of the 1997 movie, The Lost World: Jurassic Park. The video game was one of the first PlayStation- (also on Sega Saturn) console title to be recorded with an original live orchestral score. Giacchino has since continued his relationship with DreamWorks which also included composing the score for the Small Soldiers (video game) in 1998, providing full orchestral scores for many of their popular videogames. He also worked with Pandemic studios to create the theme for Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction. Giacchino's award-winning compositions covers the first three Medal of Honor series, (Underground, Allied Assault and Frontline, along with the original Medal of Honor and Heroes: 2), and also the scores for several other World War II-related video games like Secret Weapons Over Normandy, Call of Duty and Call of Duty: Finest Hour. Additionally, Giacchino composed themes for The Incredibles: Rise of the Underminer, and co-wrote the theme of Black with composer Chris Tilton. He also composed the score for Alias, which was based on the television series of the same name. In 2008 Giacchino wrote music for Turning Point: Fall of Liberty. In 2007, he returned to the Medal of Honor franchise as he composed the music for Medal of Honor: Airborne.

Film and television

Giacchino's work on various video games led to his entrance into television.

In 2001, J. J. Abrams, producer of the television series Alias, discovered Giacchino through his video game work and asked him to provide the new show's soundtrack. The soundtrack featured a mix of full orchestral pieces frequently intermingled with upbeat electronic music, a departure from much of his previous work. Giacchino would go on to provide the score for J.J. Abrams's 2004 television series Lost, creating an acclaimed score which employed a unique process of using spare pieces of a plane fuselage for percussion parts. The score for Lost is also notable for a signature thematic motif: a brass fall-off at the end of certain themes. Just like his counterpart Stu Phillips, he worked with the television show creator Abrams on his shows with his music scores while Abrams supplied the show's main themes on his certain shows such as Alias.

In 2004, Giacchino received his first big feature film commission. Brad Bird, director of Pixar's The Incredibles, asked Giacchino to provide the soundtrack for the film after having heard his work on Alias. The upbeat jazz orchestral sound was a departure in style not only for Giacchino but for Pixar, which had previously relied on Randy and Thomas Newman for all of its films. Director Brad Bird had originally sought out John Barry - perhaps best known for his work on the early James Bond films—but Barry was reportedly unwilling to repeat the styles of his earlier works.

Giacchino was nominated for two Grammy Awards in 2005 for The Incredibles: Best Score Soundtrack Album for Motion Picture, Television or Other Visual Media and Best Instrumental Composition.

Like his other counterparts Joel McNeely, J. A. C. Redford and Frank DeVol, Giacchino mostly associated with Disney from early in his career up to most recently, ranging from video games such as Mickey Mania and Gargoyles to films such as The Incredibles and eventually collaborated with Walt Disney Imagineering in creating two new soundtracks for the updated versions of Space Mountain at Disneyland, Space Mountain: Mission 2 at Disneyland Paris, and Space Mountain at Hong Kong Disneyland.

Giacchino also composed scores for the 2005 films Sky High and The Family Stone, and the television movie The Muppets' Wizard of Oz. Additionally, he wrote the music for Joseph Barbera's final theatrical Tom and Jerry cartoon The Karate Guard, and scored the Abrams-directed 2006 film Mission: Impossible III. Giacchino's next musical achievement was his Paris-inspired score for the Disney-Pixar film Ratatouille, which includes the theme song "Le Festin", performed by French artist Camille. He received his first Academy Award nomination for this score. He also created the score for Abrams' 2009 Star Trek film.

Giacchino scored the Pixar film Up (and its accompanying animated short Partly Cloudy), for which he collaborated with director Pete Docter. This marked the first time Giacchino worked with a Pixar director other than Brad Bird. This work gained Giacchino his first Academy Award for Best Original Score: the first-ever win for Pixar in that category. Giacchino notes that he won on the same night as his SVA classmate Joel Harlow won for Best Makeup Oscar for Star Trek.

Giacchino has continued his collaboration with J. J. Abrams. For the Abrams-produced monster film Cloverfield, Giacchino wrote an homage to Japanese monster scores in an overture entitled "ROAR!", which played over the credits, and constituted the only original music for the film. He also composed for the pilot of the Abrams-produced American television series Fringe, after which Giacchino gave scoring duties to his assistant Chad Seiter, who scored the first half of season one. The task was then passed on to Chris Tilton, who scored the latter half of season one and all subsequent seasons.

Giacchino is noted for using humorous titles filled with puns on his soundtrack albums. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes and Jurassic World in particular had many ape and dinosaur-related double entendres such as "Gorilla Warfare" and "Raptor Your Heart Out". Many of those have references to previous works of his, both in style and naming. Giacchino used themes from the track "U-Boat" from the Medal of Honor soundtrack in the tracks "Sawyer Jones and the Temple of Boom" and "Sub-Primed" from the 5th and 6th season Lost soundtracks as the submarine motif. In terms of naming, the score for The Incredibles contains a piece named "100 Mile Dash", and subsequently Ratatouille had "100 Rat Dash" and Up had "Three Dog Dash". Another series of examples: "World's Worst Beach Party" from the first Lost album, "World's Worst Last 4 Minutes To Live" from the Mission: Impossible III soundtrack, "Galaxy's Worst Sushi Bar" from Star Trek (2010 deluxe release), "World's Worst Landscaping" from the second Lost album, "World's Worst Car Wash" from the soundtrack album Lost: The Final Season, and "World's Worst Field Trip" from the soundtrack of Super 8. The soundtrack for Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol also has a track titled "World's Worst Parking Valet". Inversely, the score for Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction has a track entitled "World's Best Carpool Lane"; the Speed Racer score has tracks entitled "World's Best Autopia" and "World's Worst Road Rage." In November 2015 it was announced that Giacchino would be returning to Pixar to score The Incredibles 2.

Additional compositions

In addition to his long list of soundtracks, in 2005 Giacchino collaborated with Walt Disney Imagineering in creating two new soundtracks for the updated versions of Space Mountain at Disneyland, Space Mountain: Mission 2 at Disneyland Paris, and Space Mountain at Hong Kong Disneyland. Giacchino was also contracted by Sarah Vowell, who played character Violet in The Incredibles, to compose the score to the audio version of her book Assassination Vacation. Michael Giacchino's music can also be heard in "Star Tours: The Adventure Continues" during the "travel log videos" shown in the queue line for both the Disneyland and Walt Disney World versions of the attraction.

In 2009, he was asked to conduct the Academy Awards orchestra for the 81st Academy Awards. For this project he rearranged many famous movie themes in different styles, including a 1930s Big Band treatment of Lawrence of Arabia and a bossa nova of Moon River. Giacchino also composed the fanfare for the 100th Anniversary logo for Paramount Pictures.

Acting

Although he has collaborated frequently with J.J. Abrams, when Abrams was hired to write and direct Star Wars: The Force Awakens, he opted to have renowned series symphonist John Williams compose the music instead of Giacchino. By way of apology, Abrams cast his friend/collaborator Giacchino as First Order Stormtrooper FN-3181 who, during the raid on Jakku in the opening sequence of the film, throws Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) down to his knees in front of Kylo Ren (Adam Driver).

Awards, nominations and recognition

Awards

• 2001 Interactive Achievement Awards for Original Music Composition - Medal of Honor: Underground
• 2003 Game Developers Choice Awards for Excellence in Audio - Medal of Honor: Allied Assault
• 2003 Interactive Achievement Awards for Original Music Composition - Medal of Honor: Frontline
• 2004 IFMCA Award for Score of the Year - The Incredibles
• 2004 IFMCA Award for Composer of the Year
• 2004 Game Developers Choice Awards for Excellence in Audio - Call of Duty
• 2005 Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Composition for a Series (Dramatic Underscore) - Lost: Pilot
• 2007 Film & TV Music Award for Best Score for a Short Film - Lifted
• 2007 StreamingSoundtracks.com Award for Composer of the Year
• 2008 Grammy Award for Best Score Soundtrack Album - Ratatouille
• 2010 Broadcast Film Critics Association Awards for Best Score - Up
• 2010 Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score - Up
• 2010 Grammy Award for Best Score Soundtrack Album - Up
• 2010 Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Composition - "Married Life (from Up)"
• 2010 BAFTA Award for Best Film Music - "Up"
• 2010 Academy Award for Best Original Score - Up
• 2015 World Soundtrack Academy Award for Composer of the Year

Nominations

• 2005 Grammy Award for Best Score Soundtrack Album - The Incredibles
• 2005 Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Composition - "The Incredits" (from The Incredibles)
• 2008 Academy Award for Best Original Score - Ratatouille
• 2008 Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Composition for a Series - Lost: The Constant
• 2010 Grammy Award for Best Score Soundtrack Album - Star Trek
• 2010 Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Arrangement - "Up With End Credits (from Up)"
• 2010 Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Composition for a Series - Lost: The End

Recognition

• The score for Season 1 of Lost was cited by New Yorker music critic Alex Ross as "some of the most compelling film music of the past year."

Discography

	"Oceanic 815" from Lost (2005) Sample of brass fall-off from the first season finale of Lost "Mission: Impossible Theme" from Mission: Impossible III (2006) Sample of Mission: Impossible theme in Mission: Impossible III (based on the original theme by Lalo Schifrin) "Suspense Music" from Medal of Honor: Allied Assault (2002) Sample of suspense music in Medal of Honor: Allied Assault
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Films

Year	Title	Director	Studio	Notes
1997	Legal Deceit	Monika Harris	Spectrum Entertain	N/A
1999	My Brother the Pig	Erik Fleming	Unapix Productions	N/A
2001	The Trouble With Lou	Gregor Joackim	Two Loose Cannons	N/A
2003	Sin	Michael Stevens	Singular Pictures	N/A
2004	The Incredibles	Brad Bird	Walt Disney Pictures Pixar Animation Studios	Nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Score Soundtrack Album Nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Composition
2005	Sky High	Mike Mitchell	Walt Disney Pictures	N/A
2005	The Muppets' Wizard of Oz	Kirk Thatcher	Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment	TV Movie
2005	The Family Stone	Thomas Bezucha	20th Century Fox	N/A
2006	Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World	Albert Brooks	Warner Independent Pictures	N/A
2006	Mission: Impossible III	J.J. Abrams	Paramount Pictures	First film with J.J. Abrams
2007	Ratatouille	Brad Bird	Walt Disney Pictures Pixar Animation Studios	Grammy Award for Best Score Soundtrack Album Nominated for a Academy Award for Best Original Score
2008	Cloverfield	Matt Reeves	Paramount Pictures	Credited as "Written by" Only composed "Roar!" for ending credits
2008	Speed Racer	The Wachowskis	Warner Bros. Pictures	N/A
2009	Star Trek	J.J. Abrams	Paramount Pictures	Nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Score Soundtrack Album
2009	Up	Pete Docter	Walt Disney Pictures Pixar Animation Studios	Academy Award for Best Original Score BAFTA Award for Best Music Grammy Award for Best Score Soundtrack Album Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Composition Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score - Up
2009	Land of the Lost	Brad Silberling	Universal Pictures	N/A
2009	Earth Days	Robert Stone	Zeitgeist Films	Documentary Film
2010	Let Me In	Matt Reeves	Overture Films	N/A
2011	Cars 2	John Lasseter	Walt Disney Pictures Pixar Animation Studios	N/A
2011	Super 8	J.J. Abrams	Paramount Pictures	N/A
2011	Monte Carlo	Thomas Bezucha	20th Century Fox	N/A
2011	50/50	Jonathan Levine	Summit Entertainment	N/A
2011	Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol	Brad Bird	Paramount Pictures	N/A
2012	John Carter	Andrew Stanton	Walt Disney Pictures	N/A
2013	Star Trek Into Darkness	J.J. Abrams	Paramount Pictures	N/A
2014	Dawn of the Planet of the Apes	Matt Reeves	20th Century Fox	N/A
2014	This Is Where I Leave You	Shawn Levy	Warner Bros. Pictures	N/A
2015	Jupiter Ascending	The Wachowskis	Warner Bros. Pictures	N/A
2015	Tomorrowland	Brad Bird	Walt Disney Pictures	N/A
2015	Jurassic World	Colin Trevorrow	Universal Pictures	N/A
2015	Inside Out	Pete Docter	Walt Disney Pictures Pixar Animation Studios	N/A
2016	Zootopia	Byron Howard Rich Moore	Walt Disney Pictures Walt Disney Animation Studios	N/A
2016	Star Trek Beyond	Justin Lin	Paramount Pictures	N/A
2016	Doctor Strange	Scott Derrickson	Marvel Studios	N/A
2017	War for the Planet of the Apes	Matt Reeves	20th Century Fox	N/A
2019	The Incredibles 2	Brad Bird	Walt Disney Pictures Pixar Animation Studios	N/A

Video games

Title	Year	Developer(s)	Notes
Mickey Mania: The Timeless Adventures of Mickey Mouse	1994	Traveller's Tales	Additional compositions
Gargoyles	1995	Disney Interactive Studios	N/A
Maui Mallard in Cold Shadow	1995	Disney Interactive	N/A
The Lost World: Jurassic Park	1997	DreamWorks Interactive Appaloosa Interactive	N/A
Chaos Island	1997	DreamWorks Interactive	N/A
Small Soldiers	1998	DreamWorks Interactive	N/A
T'ai Fu: Wrath of the Tiger	1999	DreamWorks Interactive	N/A
Warpath: Jurassic Park	1999	DreamWorks Interactive Black Ops Entertainment	N/A
Medal of Honor	1999	DreamWorks Interactive	N/A
Muppet Monster Adventure	2000	Magenta Software Jim Henson Interactive	N/A
Medal of Honor: Underground	2000	DreamWorks Interactive	N/A
Medal of Honor: Allied Assault	2002	2015, Inc.	N/A
Medal of Honor: Frontline	2002	DreamWorks Interactive	N/A
Call of Duty	2003	Infinity Ward	N/A
Secret Weapons Over Normandy	2003	Totally Games	N/A
Call of Duty: United Offensive	2004	Gray Matter Interactive	Expansion pack
Call of Duty: Finest Hour	2004	Spark Unlimited Exakt Entertainment	N/A
Alias	2004	Acclaim Cheltenham	N/A
The Incredibles	2004	Heavy Iron Studios	N/A
Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction	2005	Pandemic Studios	Composed with Chris Tilton
Black	2006	Criterion Games	N/A
Medal of Honor: Vanguard	2007	EA Los Angeles	N/A
Medal of Honor: Airborne	2007	EA Los Angeles	N/A
Medal of Honor: Heroes 2	2007	EA Canada	N/A
Lost: Via Domus	2008	Ubisoft Montreal	N/A
Turning Point: Fall of Liberty	2008	Spark Unlimited	N/A
Fracture	2008	Day 1 Studios	Only producer - Music composed by Chris Tilton and Chad Seiter

Television

Title	Year	Notes
Alias	2001-2006	Bad Robot Productions
Lost	2004-2010
Six Degrees	2006-2007
Fringe	2008 (co-composer of the first season with Chris Tilton and Chad Seiter)
Undercovers	2010 (Pilot only)
Alcatraz	2012 (Pilot only)

Short films and other works

Title	Year	Notes
No Salida	1998	Short film
String Of The Kite	2003	Short film
Space Mountain at Disneyland	2005	Theme park attraction
Space Mountain at Hong Kong Disneyland	2005	Theme park attraction
Space Mountain: Mission 2 at Disneyland Paris	2005	Theme Park attraction
The Karate Guard	2005	Short film
One Man Band	2005	Short film
Jack-Jack Attack	2005	Short film
Lifted	2006	Short film
How to Hook Up Your Home Theater	2007	Short film
81st Academy Awards	2009	Awards ceremony, conductor
Partly Cloudy	2009	Short film
Dug's Special Mission	2009	Short film (edited from Up)
Prep & Landing	2009	TV Christmas Special
Day & Night	2010	Short film
Space Mountain at Magic Kingdom	2010	Theme park attraction
Prep & Landing: Operation: Secret Santa	2010	Short film
Star Tours: The Adventures Continue at Disneyland and Disney's Hollywood Studios	2011	Theme park attraction
The Ballad of Nessie	2011	Short film
Prep & Landing: Naughty vs. Nice	2011	TV Christmas special
La Luna	2011	Short film
Toy Story of Terror!	2013	TV Halloween special
Ratatouille: L’Aventure Totalement Toquée de Rémy	2014	Theme park attraction
Toy Story That Time Forgot	2014	TV Christmas special
Riley's First Date?	2015	Short film

[ Source: Wikipedia ]