John Debney

Biography:

John Cardon Debney (born August 18, 1956) is an American composer and conductor known for scoring films, television shows, and video games. His work spans a wide range of genres, including comedy, horror, science fiction, fantasy, thrillers, and action-adventure. A frequent collaborator with The Walt Disney Company, he has composed music for their movies, TV programs, and theme park attractions. Debney has also worked with numerous directors, among them Brian Robbins, Jon Favreau, Garry Marshall, Tom Shadyac, Peter Hyams, John A. Davis, Brad Anderson, Howard Deutch, Mark Dindal, Robert Rodriguez, and Paul Tibbitt.

Throughout his career, Debney has received three Primetime Emmy Awards and earned an Academy Award nomination for his score for Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ (2004).

Born in Glendale, California, near Disney headquarters, he is the son of Disney Studios producer Louis Debney (Zorro, The Mickey Mouse Club). He began playing guitar at six and later performed in college rock bands. In 1979, he completed a B.A. in Music Composition from the California Institute of the Arts.

After working at Disney, Debney joined Mike Post before gaining further experience under Hanna-Barbera composer Hoyt Curtin. He soon began composing for television, contributing to shows such as Disneyland, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, SeaQuest DSV, A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, The Cape, The Lazarus Man, Piggsburg Pigs!, The Further Adventures of SuperTed, Doctor Who, Cagney and Lacey, Tiny Toon Adventures, The Young Riders, The New Yogi Bear Show, Police Academy: The Animated Series, Fame, Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future, Dragon’s Lair, Freshman Dorm, Pop Quiz, and Dink, the Little Dinosaur. For the latter, he won an Emmy Award for Best Main Title. By the early 1990s, he was also scoring independent films and Disneyland attractions, including Phantom Manor and It’s a Small World at Disneyland Paris, as well as SpectroMagic at Magic Kingdom. In 1993, he landed his first studio feature with Disney’s Hocus Pocus, starring Bette Midler.

In 1994, he co-wrote Friends Forever with Greg Scelsa for Greg & Steve’s album We All Live Together, Vol. 5. Since then, Debney has composed for many films, including Cats & Dogs, Bruce Almighty, I Know What You Did Last Summer, Elf, Sin City, Chicken Little, Liar Liar, Spy Kids, The Scorpion King, The Princess Diaries, Predators, and The Passion of the Christ.

His work also extends to video games, with scores for Lair and The Sims Medieval, and he wrote the theme for Nickelodeon’s Supah Ninjas in 2010.

Debney has created music for several Disney Parks nighttime shows, such as World of Color Celebrate! at Disney California Adventure, The Magic, The Memories and You! and Celebrate the Magic at Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom, and Celebrate! Tokyo Disneyland. Additionally, he arranged “When You Wish Upon a Star” as the fanfare for the Walt Disney Pictures logo, used from 1985 to 2006.