Fine artist Craig Pursley has painted while listening to various movie soundtracks for about 25 years, and thought he knew all the good movie music composers. But one film changed that.

Last April, Pursley watched “The Ultimate Gift,” a 2007 family film starring the late James Garner. He liked the music but had never heard of the composer, Mark McKenzie. He sent for the soundtrack and listened.

“I couldn’t get over how good it was,” Pursley said. He searched for other McKenzie works online, and found soundtracks for a number of little-known movies.

“This soon led to buying all 17 of his soundtracks and for the next eight months, I rarely listened to anything else,” Pursley said.

Emotive, melodic McKenzie’s film scores “are so melodic, emotive, at times powerful and, for me, at least, incredibly visual,” he said. “I could ‘see’ images that seemed to fit the music. I was creating daydreams for which his music were the soundtracks.”

Pursley was inspired to paint the images that came to him as he listened to Mc- Kenzie’s works, including “You’re Just a Man Whom God Loves” from “The Last Sin Eater” and “Entering the Cathedral” from “The Greatest Miracle.”

“In Mark’s piece called ‘Angels, Demons and Prayer’ from ‘The Greatest Miracle,’ I could see a storm brewing in the distance,” Pursley said. “I could feel the wind pick up and get cooler, which is a good time to look for funnel clouds. The clouds roll angrily and build before you can hear four distinct lightning strikes. This became my painting, ‘Dark

Horizon, Distant Thunder.’” McKenzie has done orchestration for other composers, including John Barry, who won an Oscar for his film score of “Dances with Wolves,” as well as for films including “Men in Black” and “The Nightmare Before Christmas.” He also worked with the late Michael Jackson and Sir Paul McCartney.

Register illustrator Pursley’s impressive artist’s life included working as an illustrator for the

Orange County Register for more than 20 years. He has painted sports, political and entertainment figures, including images for the (then) California Angels baseball team. His works hang in the National Baseball Hall of Fame and the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum.

Last May, Pursley wrote a fan letter to McKenzie, and “he wrote right back and we established a friendship,” he said. Both men were raised in the Midwest and found they had much in common.

“By June, I had pitched the idea to him of having a show called ‘The Circle of Inspiration’ at the Tirage Art Gallery in Pasadena. He was for it and so were the folks at the gallery. Although they no longer have one-man shows there, they thought this was interesting enough to give it a try.”

As Pursley now lives in historic Bath, New Hampshire, and McKenzie in San Pedro, they did not meet in person before the opening day of the exhibit, Feb. 7.

“Others in the music industry hold a very high opinion of (McKenzie), too,” Pursley said. “You may wonder why he isn’t as wellknown as Hans Zimmer or John Williams.

“If fairness can prevail, (McKenzie) should soon be regarded as the best ever in his field.”