Danny Elfman was born in Los Angeles, California, the son of Blossom Elfman ( née Bernstein ), a writer and teacher, and Milton Elfman, a teacher who was in the Air Force.

From 1976 and on it was led by Danny Elfman, until 1995 when they suddenly retired.

Elfman was apprehensive at first because of his lack of formal training, but with orchestration assistance from Oingo Boingo guitarist and arranger Steve Bartek, he achieved his goal of emulating the mood of such composers as Nino Rota and Bernard Herrmann.

Elfman immediately developed a rapport with Burton and has gone on to score all but two of Burton's major studio releases: Ed Wood which was under production while Elfman and Burton were having a fight, and Sweeney Todd.

Since then, Elfman has scored every film that Tim Burton has directed except for Ed Wood ( because of a falling out that they had ) and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street because the music was based on Stephen Sondheim's musical.

This was also the year the cult movie Forbidden Zone was released, which included rearrangements of, and homages to, Calloway songs written by Danny Elfman, a Calloway fan.

From 1976 it was led by songwriter / vocalist Danny Elfman, who has since achieved success as a composer for film and television.

The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo, formed in late 1972 by Richard Elfman, was a musical theater troupe in the tradition of Spike Jones and Frank Zappa, performing an eclectic repertoire ranging from Cab Calloway covers to instrumentals in the style of Balinese gamelan and Russian ballet music.

When the group began to move away from its cabaret style towards a more pop / rock format, Richard Elfman made a film based on the band's stage performance, Forbidden Zone, which was released in 1980 and filmed in black and white with a cast mostly made up of band members and friends.

By this time, Richard was no longer a group member, and the band had coalesced into an octet: Danny Elfman on lead vocals ; Steve Bartek on guitars ; Richard Gibbs on keyboards ; Kerry Hatch on bass ; Johnny " Vatos " Hernandez on drums ; and Leon Schneiderman, Sam " Sluggo " Phipps and Dale Turner on horns.

The first release was officially a Danny Elfman solo record in 1984 ( titled So-Lo ); it was actually a group effort released under Elfman's name.

Though the band was officially a ten-piece ensemble, only five members ( Elfman, Bartek, Avila, Hernandez and Fitzgerald ) were pictured in the album's liner notes.

However, Danny Elfman insists that the name change was virtually meaningless, and " kind of an afterthought.

Following the band's dissolution, frontman Danny Elfman turned full-time to writing film scores, having composed several scores through the 1980s and early 1990s while the band was active.

Standing in for Elfman was Brendan McCreary.

Boortz was an avid listener and regular caller to the morning show, which was hosted by Herb Elfman.

Elfman also provided the singing voice for Jack Skellington in Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas and the voices of both Barrel and the " Clown with the Tear-Away Face ".

Burton has said of his relationship with Elfman: " We don't even have to talk about the music.

When asked during a 2007 phone-in interview on XETRA-FM if he ever had any notions of performing in an Oingo Boingo reunion, Elfman immediately rejected the idea and stated that in the last few years with the band he had begun to develop significant and irreversible hearing damage as a result of his continuous exposure to the high noise levels involved in performing in a rock band.

Smith recorded an orchestral version of " Between the Bars " with composer Danny Elfman for the movie.

Then, starting with 1985's Pee-wee's Big Adventure, Danny Elfman began scoring major films with increasing frequency, including almost all of Tim Burton's films.

( 1996 ), another film of Burton's with music composed by Elfman.

The music for the show was provided by a diverse set of musicians, including Mark Mothersbaugh, The Residents, Todd Rundgren, Danny Elfman ( who provided the score for both of the Pee-wee movies ), Mitchell Froom, Van Dyke Parks, George Clinton and Dweezil Zappa with Scott Thunes ( spelled ' Tunis ' in the credits ).

Elfman also supplied the voice for the " Clown with the Tear-Away Face ".

McDowell and Burton experienced creative differences, which convinced Burton to make the film as a musical with lyrics and compositions by frequent collaborator Danny Elfman.

Elfman and Burton created a rough storyline and two-thirds of the film's songs, while Selick and his team of animators began production in July 1991 in San Francisco, California with a crew of over 120 workers, utilizing 20 sound stages for filming .. Joe Ranft worked as a storyboard artist, while Paul Berry was hired as an animation supervisor.

Directed by Richard Elfman, who co-wrote the film with fellow Mystic Knights member Matthew Bright, it was the first film scored by his brother Danny Elfman.

On their way to school, Frenchy Hercules ( Marie-Pascale Elfman ) and her brother Flash ( Phil Gordon ) have a conversation with Squeezit Henderson ( Matthew Bright ), who tells them that, while being violently beaten by his mother, he had a vision of his transgendered sister René ( also played by Bright ), who had fallen into the Sixth Dimension through the door in the Hercules ' basement.

There, he is captured by Satan ( Danny Elfman ), with whom he makes a deal to bring him the Princess in exchange for Satan's help freeing René and Frenchy.

As Richard's interest shifted to filmmaking, he passed leadership of the band to younger brother Danny Elfman, who had begun to lose interest in musical theatre, and had gained interest in other musical styles such as ska, and had become " sick of lugging around so much stuff with the theatre troupe.

Two sequences from the original 16mm footage were featured on the 2004 DVD release: one of Danny Elfman, as Satan, performing " Minnie the Moocher " ( later reshot with visual elements borrowed from the original 16mm sequence and alternate lyrics ), and another of Marie-Pascale Elfman, singing " Johnny ".

The sequence with Elfman as Satan, and members of the Oingo Boingo as his minions, came from live shows, in which the band would perform Cab Calloway tunes like " St. James Infirmary Blues " in the same costumes.

For the " Yiddishe Charleston " scene, Richard Elfman had shot the sequence with him lip-syncing to an old recording of the song, but was later unable to acquire the rights to the recording, and had to record a new version of the song while attempting to sync the new recording with the footage.

He made his film scoring début in 1980 for the film Forbidden Zone directed by his older brother Richard Elfman.

In 1972 Richard Elfman founded the American New Wave band / performance art group, originally called The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo.

As Richard Elfman's interest shifted to filmmaking, he passed leadership of the band to younger brother Danny Elfman, who had recently returned from spending time in Africa playing violin and studying percussion instruments.

Dead Man's Party has been " Elfo-Approved " ( appreciated and supported by Richard Elfman ), are joined onstage by former Oingo Boingo members ( notably Johnny Hernandez and Steve Bartek ), and own one of Oingo Boingo's balaphones.

* The Complete History of the Oingo Boingo-by Richard Elfman

Fellow composers Richard Band, Graeme Revell, Christopher Young, Danny Elfman and Brian Tyler consider Herrmann to be a major inspiration.

Forbidden Zone was made as an attempt to capture the essence of The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo's live performances on film, and also as a means for both Richard Elfman to retire from music to work on film projects, and to serve as a transition between Oingo Boingo's former cabaret style and a New Wave-based style.

The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo were formed in late 1972 by Richard Elfman, as a musical theatre troupe.

But as the project grew to 35mm and the storyline evolved, Richard Elfman found himself re-shooting many of the original scenes to fit the new film.

Marie-Pascale Elfman, at the time of shooting, was married to director Richard Elfman.

When Cunningham and Elfman ran out of money during production, Richard and Marie-Pascale Elfman helped finance the movie by selling houses, before Carl Borack put money into the production in order for Elfman to complete the film.

According to Richard Elfman, Tyrrell and Villechaize fought periodically throughout the production of the film.

The Elfmans ' grandfather, Herman Bernstein, also appeared in the film, and Richard Elfman's accountant appeared under the name " Hyman Diamond " because Elfman had no idea whether or not he wanted to be credited.

Richard Elfman had never gone to film school when production on the film started, and " I didn't know what I was getting into.

In one scene, Richard Elfman brought in a young man to mouth the words of " Bim Bam Boom ," but when he was put in front of the camera, he stood there as the scene was shot.