Honorary Oscar winner Ennio Morricone during the 79th Annual Academy Awards at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, CA on Sunday, February 25, 2007.

Composer-conductor Ennio Morricone, who has composed more than 300 motion picture scores over a 45-year career, has been voted an Honorary Award by the Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

The Award, an Oscar® statuette, will be given to Morricone at the 79th Academy Awards® presentation on February 25, 2007, “for his magnificent and multifaceted contributions to the art of film music.”

Morricone has earned five Academy Award nominations for original score — for “Days of Heaven” (1978), “The Mission” (1986), “The Untouchables” (1987), “Bugsy” (1991) and “Malèna” (2000) — but has not previously received an Oscar.

“The board was responding not just to the remarkable number of scores that Mr. Morricone has produced,” said Academy President Sid Ganis, “but to the fact that so many of them are beloved and popular masterpieces.”

While the bulk of his work has been on Italian films, including “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly,” “Once upon a Time in America” and “Cinema Paradiso,” Morricone has composed memorable scores for such international titles as “Bulworth,” “In the Line of Fire,” “La Cage aux Folles” and “Two Mules for Sister Sara.” His current project, “Leningrad,” has been announced for a 2008 release.

Born in Rome, Morricone was hired in 1964 by Sergio Leone and began a long collaboration with the director on what came to be known as “spaghetti westerns,” though his career has spanned most film genres from comedy to romance to horror.

Acceptance Speech

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much.

[He then speaks in Italian. Clint Eastwood translates.]

Yes. I will tell you what he's saying. Ennio wants to thank the Academy and all the people who really truly wanted him to have this great honor.

His deep gratitude goes to all the directors who had faith in him. Without them he says he wouldn't be here today.

His thoughts go out to the artists who have never received this honor. And even though they work with enormous commitment and talent, to all of them he wishes that their work would be recognized as his is tonight.

He says this Oscar is not a point of arrival but a starting point to continue writing with the same passion and dedication he's had since the very beginning on the screen.

He dedicates this Oscar to his wife Maria who has always been there with him all these years with enormous commitment and love, which he feels the same for her. Maria.