Suffering a brain aneurysm, composer Shirley Walker died Wednesday evening in Los Angeles, California. She was at the age of 61. In 1986, Walker scored Disney’s Fluppy Dogs, a pilot for a rejected television series. Later, she orchestrated music for the first live-action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film (1990). She also orchestrated and wrote music for Dick Tracy (1990), while arranging its Oscar-winning song “Sooner or Later (I Always Get My Man).” It was with Batman (1989) that Walker began a professional relationship with the Caped Crusader, conducting music for the Tim Burton hit and orchestrating the score for its second sequel, Batman Forever (1995). Furthermore, she composed music for Batman: The Animated Series (1992), which landed her an Annie nomination. After Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993) and The New Batman Adventures (1997), Walker finally won a Daytime Emmy for her work on Batman Beyond (1999).

Meanwhile, Superman: The Animated Series (1996) brought Walker another Annie nomination, while The Zeta Project (2001) delivered that and a Daytime Emmy nomination. In-between those projects, she composed music for HBO’s Spawn animated series (1997). Walker’s final superhero undertaking, DC: The New Frontier, will be released directly to DVD in 2007. For more information on the life of Shirley Walker, please visit the Big Cartoon Database and the Internet Movie Database. Thanks to George C. at the Animated News Forum for the notice of this tragic news.