Dennis Maitland, Sound Mixer for Classic Television and Big-Name Directors
Maitland began his career on television shows like The Ed Sullivan Show and The Jackie Gleason Show before turning to features by such filmmakers as John Cassavetes, Paul Mazursky, Norman Jewison and Arthur Hiller.
Production sound mixer Dennis Maitland, who worked on more than 80 feature films and numerous television shows, died on April 1, 2011, in New York City. He was 80.
Credited as the first sound mixer to engineer a digital motion picture soundtrack, Maitland began his career on television on The Ed Sullivan Show and was also employed on The Jackie Gleason Show. He worked with some the top directors in Hollywood, including John Cassavetes, Paul Mazursky, Norman Jewison, Herb Ross and Arthur Hiller, racking up an impressive slate of credits including Moonstruck, Lenny, The Prince of Tides, The Pawnbroker, …And Justice for All, Three Days of the Condor and Prizzi’s Honor.
As a music mixer, Maitland worked with Miles Davis, Frank Sinatra, Count Basie, the Beatles, Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughn, and the Philharmonic Orchestras of New York, Boston, Berlin, Philadelphia and Montreal. On Broadway, he was the sound designer for Prisoner of Second Avenue.
Maitland received the Cinema Audio Society's highest honor, the Career Achievement Award, in 2009 at the 45th CAS Awards.
"The sound community is saddened by the loss of such respected sound mixer, said CAS president David E. Fluhr. "The outpouring of appreciation and affection at our CAS Awards Dinner in 2009 when Dennis was honored with the CAS Career Achievement Award was an indication of the high regard he was held in by our organization and the industry."
Maitland is survived by his wife, Marja; daughter Kim Maitland, a recordist; son Tod Maitland, a production sound mixer; son Dennis Maitland Jr., a boom operator; his mother; and seven grandchildren.