# The Mike Post of our times **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** tv-shows-scripted, music\ **Created:** [January 11, 2023, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mike-post-of-our-times/978057 "2023-01-11T21:50:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2023, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mike-post-of-our-times/978057/1 "2023-01-11T21:50:10Z")
From the 1970s to the 1990s, composer Mike Post produced a long string of hit TV theme songs, many of which even made the music charts. Celebrated examples include the themes to _The Rockford Files_, _The Hill Street Blues_, _The A-Team_, _Magnum, P.I._, _L.A. Law_, and _Law & Order_. Is there any TV composer in the last two decades with a remotely similar claim to fame? Full-length theme songs seem to have fallen by the wayside, with many shows opting instead for just a title card with a brief sound effect or musical cue (e.g., _Frasier_, _Lost_, _Squid Game_). Sure, there are exceptions, and even some particularly memorable themes, like _Game of Thrones_. But I can’t think of any composers who have produced _several_ memorable theme tunes for today’s shows. Can you? Who’s the go-to guy (or gal) for TV theme songs these days? Who’s the Mike Post of 21st-century television? And for that matter, who was television’s Mike Post _before_ television had Mike Post? ---
**Author:** ![74westy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/74westy/32/3950_2.png) [@74westy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/74westy)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2023, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mike-post-of-our-times/978057/2 "2023-01-11T21:59:11Z")
Danny Elfman? > **[Danny Elfman | Television and other projects](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danny_Elfman#Television_and_other_projects)** > > In addition to his music for film, Elfman also penned themes for the television series The Simpsons, Tales from the Crypt, The Flash and Desperate Housewives, which won Elfman his first Emmy. He also adapted his original themes for the animated versions of Batman and Beetlejuice. Occasional forays into serial television include episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Amazing Stories and Pee-wee's Playhouse, the miniseries When We Rise co-composed with Chris Bacon, and themes for the Netfli He has ... ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2023, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mike-post-of-our-times/978057/3 "2023-01-11T22:05:51Z")
Would like to note that sections of _The Rockford Files_ theme were outright stolen from Billy Preston’s _Space Race_, released two years prior. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/8lvan0UGSzI/maxresdefault.jpg "Billy Preston ~ Space Race 1973 Funky Purrfection Version") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lvan0UGSzI) That is all. ---
**Author:** ![Banquet\_Bear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banquet_bear/32/373_2.png) [@Banquet\_Bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banquet_Bear)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2023, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mike-post-of-our-times/978057/4 "2023-01-11T23:14:53Z")
…Bear McCreary would be up there. Not as iconic as Post and Carpenter, but up there. > **[Bear McCreary](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bear_McCreary)** > > Bear McCreary (born February 17, 1979) is an American musician and composer of film, television, and video game scores based in Los Angeles, California. His work includes the scores of the television series Battlestar Galactica (2004), Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Outlander, The Walking Dead and The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, The Serpent Queen, the video games Call of Duty: Vanguard, God of War and Ragnarök, and the film Godzilla: King of the Monsters. > McCreary has been nominated for an... ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2023, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mike-post-of-our-times/978057/5 "2023-01-11T23:21:06Z")
The Who wrote a song in tribute of Mike Post. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/WI9fGLTd0Xs/maxresdefault.jpg "Mike Post Theme") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WI9fGLTd0Xs) Henry Mancini wrote a large number of TV themes. _Peter Gunn, Mr. Lucky, NBC Mystery Movie, Newhart, Remington Steele, Hotel, Once Is Not Enough, and Ripley’s Believe it or Not_ are among his themes. He also wrote the theme to the “Viewer Mail” segment of _Late Night With David Letterman_. ---
**Author:** ![XOldiesJock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/ec9cab/32.png) [@XOldiesJock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XOldiesJock)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2023, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mike-post-of-our-times/978057/6 "2023-01-11T23:22:33Z")
> [@psychonaut](#): > > _And for that matter, who was television’s Mike Post before television had Mike Post?_ In the 1950s, 60s and 70s, a guy named Frank DeVol wrote the themes and incidental music for a lot of TV shows, notably “My Three Sons,” “Family Affair,” “The Brady Bunch” and other sitcoms, along with “McCloud” and “The Love Boat.” He was quite prolific. and was an actor too. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2023, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mike-post-of-our-times/978057/7 "2023-01-12T00:39:21Z")
I love to add good TV show themes to my collection, and it just seems shows don’t have them anymore. Without A Trace was a very intense, powerful…30 seconds. Castle was like ten seconds. Can’t really put them out on a 45 rpm record. 🙂 And even those are …what? fifteen, twenty years old? (And the actual released singles of Rockford and Magnum and SWAT were so padded I started to get annoyed. Now I can just rip them from the DVDs.) Did you know, a lot of iconic themes (Hawaii 5-0, Rockford Files, Law and Order) changed several times over the years? There’s no “one” version. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2023, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mike-post-of-our-times/978057/8 "2023-01-12T01:14:24Z")
I don’t know whether he’s still active, but W. G. Snuffy Walden deserves mention. > **[W. G. Snuffy Walden](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._G._Snuffy_Walden)** > > William Garrett Walden, known as W. G. Snuffy Walden (born February 13, 1950), is an American musician and composer of film and television soundtracks. Walden is an Emmy Award winner for the theme music to The West Wing (NBC), has been nominated for numerous Emmys throughout his career, and has received 26 BMI Awards. > Walden was born in Louisiana on February 13, 1950, and raised in Houston, Texas. He graduated from Clear Creek High School in League City, Texas in 1967. In college he studied sc... ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2023, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mike-post-of-our-times/978057/9 "2023-01-12T05:14:14Z")
> [@74westy](#): > > Danny Elfman? I see Elfman more as a contemporary of Mike Post than as successor—most of his best-known TV theme songs are from the 1980s and 1990s. But maybe I’m wrong; has he written a lot of TV themes in the last 20 years or so that people would instantly recognize? (The article you linked to said he did _Desperate Housewives_ in 2004, and while I did see that show at the time, I had to visit YouTube just now to be reminded of what the music sounded like.)