American Animation with Memorable BGM

Almost every baddie in Courage The Cowardly Dog had their own little tune. The two that stuck out to me was the one that played while Courage was being chased on jetski by Dr. Gerbil and the music that played in the episode with the walking tower with the scientist who fired those negativity cannonballs.
 
TV series: Avatar (especially the finale) and the DCAU.

Movies: The Land Before Time, The Simpsons Movie, Pocahontas, Ratatouille, Beauty and the Beast, pretty much everything Joe Hishaishi did for Studio Ghibli.
 
Avatar: The Last Airbender--it's a MUST, the score for this fantastic series is really the most beautiful I've heard for an American cartoon.


Batman: The Animated Series--Batman Beyond got one (that should be re-released since it's out of print), why not this one?
 
They're actually trying to get Avatar's soundtrack released. That's an instant buy for me.

Can't believe no one's brought up The Simpsons yet. You can't get the theme out of your head, and the show has had some really memorable and creative BGM over the years it has been on the air. Futurama is much the same way. One thing the McFarlane toons can't trump Gorening's work is on the BGM.
 
They're able to put together some really fantastic background music for both Family Guy and American Dad. Listen to some of the stuff they've scored for the chicken fights, or for the action sequence from "Long John Peter".
 
No love for the SWAT Kats music? The opening themes alone warrant the show a mention here. It was the perfect addition to the hard, dark feel Megakat City had and rock music with an awesome jet is always necessary.
 
For more orchestral music, one would have to pay re-use fees to the members of the orchestra. However, for the stuff that the composers perform themselves it would cost significantly less...but there's still the question of widespread appeal. Of course, we'd love releases of this music, but a subsection of fans hardly spells profit for the studios whose products the music was written for.

Still, there can be exceptions. Many years ago, there was a promo CD for Kevin Manthei's "Invader Zim" music. It is still some of the finest music I've ever heard for an animated series. (His "Xiaolin Showdown" music is pretty good, too.)

In terms of favorites, Adam Berry's "Kim Possible" scoring is quite enjoyable. Christopher Tyng has written some exciting music for "Futurama" and, discovering the show for the first time last year, I found that "Galaxy High" had some terrific underscoring, courtesy of Don Felder.

With the movie, TV and song parodies that were packed into the music, Charlie Brissette's work on "The Angry Beavers" holds a place in my heart...and hopefully, one day, my collection.
 
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