Manuel De Sica

Italian composer Manuel De Sica was born in Rome on 24 February 1949. His father was the film director and actor Vittorio De Sica and his mother was the Catalan actress María Mercader (whose brother Ramón Mercader murdered Trotsky in Mexico in 1940). He studied with Bruno Maderna at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia.

His first chamber music compositions were published by Ricordi, based on the interest shown by Renzo Rossellini, artistic director of the Monte Carlo Orchestra.

He also wrote symphonic works, but is best known for more than one hundred soundtracks for cinema and television, including Carlo Verdone's Al lupo, al lupo and Carlo Lizzani's Celluloide.

Manuel De Sica died from a heart attack on 5 December 2014, aged sixty-five.