Gordon Roger Alexander Buchanan Parks, born November 30, 1912, in Fort Scott, Kansas, was a groundbreaking artist known primarily as a photographer, filmmaker, and writer, but he also maintained a lesser-known career as a composer. Largely self-taught as a pianist, Parks drew inspiration from Duke Ellington and Rachmaninoff and composed works across classical, film, and ballet idioms. His concert music includes a Concerto for Piano and Orchestra, premiered by a Vienna orchestra in 1956, and Tree Symphony, completed in 1967. Parks scored several of his own films, including The Learning Tree in 1969, working with arranger Henry Brant to realize his compositions for orchestra. For Shaft's Big Score! in 1972, he wrote songs including Don't Misunderstand, featured on AllSolos, which was popularized by Nancy Wilson. He later composed scores for Solomon Northup's Odyssey and Moments Without Proper Names. In 2000, he collaborated with cellist Kermit Moore on A Star For Noon Suite. Parks died on March 7, 2006, remembered as a Renaissance figure whose creative range encompassed photography, literature, film direction, and musical composition.
