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Hugo Wilhelm Friedhofer was an American composer best known for his motion picture scores. He was born in San Francisco. His father was a cellist trained in Dresden, Germany; his mother, Eva König, was born in Germany.
Friedhofer began playing cello at the age of 13. After taking lessons in harmony and counterpoint at University of California, Berkeley, he was employed as a cellist for the People's Symphony Orchestra.
In 1929, he relocated to Hollywood, where he performed as a musician for Fox Studios productions such as Sunny Side Up and Grand Canary. Later, he was hired as an orchestrator for Warner Bros. and worked on over 50 films for the studio. While at Warners he was largely assigned to work with Max Steiner and, because he could speak German, Erich Wolfgang Korngold. Steiner, in particular, relied on Friedhofer's skill in turning his sketches into a full orchestral score. Despite his own strong skills, he remained in their shadow for many years.
In 1937, Friedhofer composed his first full-length film score, The Adventures of Marco Polo. Though he was still employed as an orchestrator through the '30s and into the '40s, he gradually received more assignments as a composer. In 1942, he composed the score for the film Chetniks! The Fighting Guerrillas.
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