Carlos Malcolm

Hi John,  Regarding my involvement in the making of the “Dr. No”, the first of the James Bond series of movies, as everyone else did, I read of their arrival in Jamaica in the Daily Gleaner.  I had just resigned from the Jamaica Broadcasting Corporation and established my own production company specializing in music jingles and radio commercials.  After they were in production for about a week, I was invited by one of the Jamaican contacts of Eon Productions to meet with Monty Norman, the musical field director of “Dr. No.”  Subsequent to my hiring I was told that the producers, Saltzman and Broccoli wanted to capture the ambience of the tropics in the music and I was mentioned as a local composer/arranger who had written two scores for two successful three-hour pantomime musicals and was capable of delivering whatever was required. A five-o’clock meeting was arranged at the Courtleigh Manor Hotel in New Kingston and I was to meet Monty Norman in the main bar.  I got there at ten of five and ordered a beer Monty was seated at the other end of the bar in conversation with two men.  From the English accent of one of the men, I assumed that he was Monty. Within a few minutes Ronnie, the Jamaican liaison arrived and introduced me to Monty. Five minutes had not passed in the exchange of salutations before Monty reached into his shirt pocket and whipped out a little blue notebook, wire-bound at the top. “What do you think of this!” he said, with a question/statement vocal inflection. In hand-drawn lines Monty had outlined the musical treble and bass clefs on which he written a melody with bass accompaniment. I perused the jottings for a few seconds humming as I went along as an indication “yes, I do read music”.  “What is it?”  I asked.  “It’s the James Bond theme”, he said. “What do you think?” Before answering, I scrutinized the bass line once more to affirm my previous observation. “I like the melody; it has drive and the bass line fits it like a glove but isn’t the motif of the bass line from Henry Mancini’s “Peter Gunn Theme”?  Monty raised his eyebrows as we looked at each other for a few seconds. “Won’t get away with it, will I?”he said, “If I were you, I’d change that bass line”, I replied. My observation and suggestion to him established a solid professional relationship between us, which, I am certain, he related to the producer, Saltzman.  In my next blog I’ll write about “Three Blind Mice”, the opening song of “Dr. No”.