Farewell and adieu Tommy Johnson, the lungs behind one of the most famous themes ever!

Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with some sad news for JAWS freaks like me. I may never have known the name Tommy Johnson, but I have heard him at least 400-500 times in my life... if not more when you factor in the spoof-usage of his work. He was the tuba player in John Williams' orchestra when recording the soundtrack for my favorite movie of all time, JAWS. That famous duh-duh duh-duh shark theme started as breath in his lungs.

Mr. Johnson died in Los Angeles at the age of 71 from cancer and kidney failure. Like most of these thankless talents in the business, when you do a little digging you find that they wove in and out of some amazing projects, lending their talent as invisible contributors to some of the greatest works of all time. Mr. Johnson not only played music for JAWS, he also recorded for Coppola's THE GODFATHER, the STAR TREK films and Cameron's TITANIC. He performed regularly with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and even the Academy Awards Orchestra.

My thoughts are with you, good sir, on this day. Thank you for your work. It'll live on as long as there are ears to listen to it.