Ennio Morricone’s score for A Fistful of Dollars has been emulated by many composers since the release of the film in 1964. The trend of fully orchestrated, symphonic scores for Western films gave way to more thin-textured works that depended on guitar.

A theme that resembles Morricone’s work for A Fistful of Dollars is Django (1966), which opens with a simple guitar melody. The score for Django was composed by Luis Bacalov. There isn’t a clear whistling melody, but some chanting accompanies the singer, not unlike the chanting in Morricone’s piece. This movie, released two years after A Fistful of Dollars and directed by Sergio Corbucci, was another Spaghetti Western that was based on Akira Kurosawa’s film Yojimbo. The plot similarities and the competition of Leone and Corbucci to tell the same story may explain the similar characteristics of each film’s title themes.

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