Kari Juusela, dean of Berklee\'s Professional Writing Division, announced the appointment of Eric Reasoner as interim chair of the college\'s Film Scoring Department. He will serve as chair for the 2006–2007 academic year, replacing founding Film Scoring chair Don Wilkins, who instituted the department in 1979. Wilkins will remain with the department and is returning to the faculty to teach.
Reasoner has been a professor of film scoring at Berklee since 1994, where he teaches the aesthetic and technical applications of composing and editing music for film. He is an alumnus of the college, having graduated Magna Cum Laude in 1982 with a degree in film composition. Reasoner first worked at Berklee in the mid-to-late 1980\'s as a part-time faculty and part-time staff member in Film Scoring, and then became the first Film Scoring Department Lab Manager in 1988, before moving to Los Angeles, in 1990.
As a professional film music editor, Reasoner was a staff editor at Segue Music, Inc.—the premier music editorial and supervision company in Hollywood. He is credited as music editor on many feature film soundtracks, including Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991 Grammy Award–winning score), Lethal Weapon 3, Lethal Weapon 4, Swing Kids, Demolition Man, Curly Sue, Last Action Hero, and Die Hard with a Vengeance, among others. He has also had the opportunity to work with such film composers as Georges Delerue, Michael Kamen, Elliot Goldenthal, Richard Gibbs, and Ira Newborn.
Said Reasoner of outgoing chair Wilkins, "Don has been my teacher, mentor, colleague, boss, and a dear friend for many years. His pioneering efforts in creating, growing, and maintaining this department is something of which he can be proud. I only hope that I can continue his work, by guiding the department in a positive direction in our immediate future."
Said Juusela, "Eric brings with him a deep knowledge of the film scoring program and a strong commitment to the college. I am certain that he will do a great job keeping the Film Scoring Department not only stable but moving forward."
Reasoner is a voting member of the NARAS Producers & Engineering Wing, and a Music Editor with the Motion Picture Editors Guild- Local 700. He is a native of Kendallville, Indiana, and currently lives in Whitinsville, MA.
Berklee is the only college in the world that offers an undergraduate degree in film scoring. The number of students who pursue this major has grown significantly in the past few years, and the department now counts nearly 300 students as majors. The Film Scoring facilities include five labs with state-of-the-art equipment and software, and a dedicated scoring stage to offer students the opportunity for hands-on application of project assignments involving film music composition, sequencing and editing, and computer application incorporating the recording, editing, and mixing of digital audio.