Samuel Lloyd Spence (March 29, 1927February 6, 2016) was an American soundtrack composer best known for his work with NFL Films. His music has also been in the EA Sports Madden NFL football video games and many football-related commercials. Biography Spence was born in San Francisco and attended the University of Southern California. In 1966, while working as a music instructor in Munich, he was hired to score the mini-documentaries that conveyed National Football League highlights and personalities to fans in the network-television era. His music cues, combined with the voices of announcers Pat Summerall, Tom Brookshier, Charlie Jones, John Facenda, and Harry Kalas created the trademark style of the NFL's sports highlights films. Initially, Mahlon Merrick was asked to provide scores for NFL Films. Merrick asked his friend, Spence, to help in the recording sessions. Spence said: "Mahlon had written marches. Toward the end of that recording session, I stuck in a couple of different pieces — my own orchestral compositions with strings and woodwinds, more like a Hollywood film score. It turned out they were Ed Sabol's favorites and he offered me a three-year contract to write, conduct, and produce NFL Films' music." In Germany, Spence wrote several TV soundtracks with Hani Chamseddine, e.g., for the Francis Durbridge thriller . After his retirement in 1990, he returned to Munich. He achieved unexpected fame in 1998 with the success of a CD compilation entitled The Power and the Glory: The Original Music & Voices Of NFL Films. Spence died at a Lewisville, Texas nursing center on February 6, 2016, at the age of 88. Discography 1970: "" – Main theme for the Durbridge series on German network TV (Single, Kuckuck Schallplatten) 1971: The Art of the Synthesizer – Interesting, Unusual and Melodic Moog Sounds (LP, Kuckuck Schallplatten) 1972: Fantastic Sounds: TV Themes and Pop Covers (LP, Kuckuck Schallplatten) 1998: The Power And The Glory: The Original Music & Voices of NFL Films 2007: Sam Spence: Our Man in Munich (Allscore – Indigo) 2009: Autumn Thunder: 40 Years of NFL Films Music Remake In 2005, Spence's music was remade by the hip hop music group Da Riffs, which can be heard on several NFL Network shows and found in the soundtrack of the game Madden NFL 06. Along with the urban remakes, the original songs still play in the game's soundtrack. His music was also included in Madden NFL 07,