Edward Benson Powell (December 5, 1909, in Savanna, Carroll County, Illinois – February 28, 1984, in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles) was an American arranger, orchestrator and composer, who served as Alfred Newman's musical lieutenant at 20th Century Fox film studios for over three decades. His contributions to the scores of 400 films culminated in the canon of widescreen Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals of the late 1950s, for which his arrangements, such as the extended "Carousel Waltz" (with Gus Levene), continue to be revived in concerts and proms (e.g. John Wilson Orchestra), as well as live-to-classic pictures (Carl Davis Chaplin tour). Powell was occasionally credited as Ed or without the middle initial, but his friends invariably called him Eddie.
A shrewd contemporary, the fellow composer and renaissance man Oscar Levant, wrote of him as being a noted film-music specialist on a par with the likes of Max Steiner, Franz Waxman and Hugo Friedhofer.[1] Musicologist Ian Sapiro firmly places him in the ranks of the “geniuses” who were largely responsible for the recognizable studio system orchestral sound of the Golden Age.[2] One of film composer John Williams’ early professional engagements was playing piano on, and assisting Powell with the sweeping arrangements recorded for the roadshow 6-track magnetic soundtrack of Carousel.[3]