Frank Denny De Vol

 Frank Denny De Vol (September 20, 1911 – October 27, 1999)

De Vol began composing music when he was 12. When he was 14, he became a member of the Musicians' Union. After playing violin in his father's orchestra and appearances in a Chinese restaurant, he joined the Horace Heidt Orchestra in the 1930s, being responsible for the arrangements. Later, he toured with the Alvino Rey Orchestra, before embarking on his recording career. From the 1940s, De Vol wrote arrangements for the studio recordings of many top singers, including Nat King Cole, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Tony Bennett, Dinah Shore, Doris Day, Vic Damone and Jaye P. Morgan. His single most famous arrangement is probably the haunting string and piano accompaniment to Cole's "Nature Boy", which was a United States Number One in 1948. De Vol wrote the scores for many Hollywood movies, receiving Academy Award nominations for four of them: Pillow Talk (1959), Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964), Cat Ballou (1965) and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967).

De Vol's numerous scores included Kiss Me Deadly (1955), What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962), McLintock! (1963), The Flight of the Phoenix (1965), The Glass Bottom Boat (1966), The Dirty Dozen (1967), Hustle (1975), Herbie Goes to Monte Carlo (1977) and Herbie Goes Bananas (1980). He also scored many Doris Day comedies and films for director Robert Aldrich. In addition, De Vol is recognized for his television theme tunes, like Family Affair, The Brady Bunch and My Three Sons. De Vol also appeared as a bandleader in the last season of My Three Sons, in addition to writing the theme music and serving as in-house composer for most of the show's twelve seasons. He also scored most episodes of Family Affair, including many of the same incidental music cues as My Three Sons. De Vol was also an actor, and made appearances on The Cara Williams Show, I Dream of Jeannie, Gidget, Bonanza, Petticoat Junction, The Brady Bunch, Get Smart, and The Jeffersons, among other TV series.

De Vol was married twice, he was married to his first wife for 54 years until her death in 1989. He remarried in 1991, but his second wife died only two years later. De Vol died of congestive heart failure on October 27, 1999, in Lafayette, California. He is buried with his first wife at Forest Lawn-Hollywood Hills.