James Horner’s CBS package is fairly extensive. This is the music that CBS uses for the election coverage since Katie Couric took over as lead anchor.

This was the theme that CBS used for all coverage of the 2003 War in Iraq. Theme music is very important in setting the tone for the program, as music instantly brings up associations in the minds of viewers. ABC used a variation of the Special Report theme that sounds rather sad and somber for the war. NBC used music by Michael Karp that sounded very dramatic. CBS, however, took a different approach, as you can hear. The network decided on a very aggressive piece of music that would shock-and-awe you. Peter Fish composed the music.

This theme was used during the last elections that Dan Rather covered for CBS. It’s composed by Michael Colina, who has done all election music for CBS since 1976.

At the top of each hour, listeners of Westwood One affiliated stations get a six minute news update from CBS News. Since early 2003 NBC News went back into the radio news business, also providing one-minute updates to Westwood One affiliates anchored by its big names. ABC News, of course, also has its own radio network and top of the hour news service.

Here’s the sounder that the CBS Radio News uses when they have a special report. It’s part of the package composed by Peter Fish.

This is the theme to Sunday Morning, composed by Johann Gottfried and called “Abblasen”. This music has been used on CBS News Sunday Morning for many years, but only since 1998 have they been using this version performed by Doc Severinson, the former Tonight Show bandleader. CBS Sunday Morning, anchored since 1994 by Charles Osgood, focuses on the day’s news but also on arts and entertainment. Being a successful morning program, CBS News executives attempted in the early 80′s to transfer the Sunday morning format to weekdays with anchors Charles Kuralt and Diane Sawyer. So this theme was also used on the weekday morning show for a short period of time.

Katie Couric was not the first Today personality to be lured to rival CBS. Her old partner Bryant Gumbel preceded her. In 1997 he moved to CBS to anchor a primetime newsmagazine: Public Eye with Bryant Gumbel. With an emphasis on serious journalism, costs were high while ratings were not. Within a year the program was cancelled and replaced by another CBS newsmagazine – 60 Minutes II. These days Public Eye is the name of the blog for CBS News. The theme for the newsmagazine Public Eye is composed and played by Neal Fox of Patterson, Walz & Fox.

And this is another CBS News experience tag. It is composed by Peter Fish. Fish has written a lot of promotional music for CBS News.

Eye to Eye got Connie Chung and CBS in a lot of trouble, which led to Chung’s exit at CBS. When Chung interviewed the mother of Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, she asked what her son thought of first lady Hillary Clinton. She answerred quietely that he thinks she is a bitch. Gingrich immediately complained that his mother was taken advantage of. The public seemed to agree. This led to Connie Chung being taken off the CBS Evening News and her departure at CBS. For the last few months of its life, this newsmagazine was just called “Eye to Eye”, without Connie Chung.

Eye to Eye was the third Connie Chung newsmagazine at CBS. It was essentially a retooled version of Face to Face with Connie Chung. While she anchored this weekly broadcast, she also co-achored the CBS Evening News with Dan Rather. The newsmagazine featured about four or five topics and lasted for an hour. Chung would anchor and contribute reports and interviews for the broadcast.

The long running CBS News promotional line is very simple: experience. This tag was used after a CBS News broadcast to drive the point home.

Up to the Minute is CBS’ overnight newscast. It premiered in 1992 with Russ Mitchell and Monica Gayle as its first anchor team. Since 1998 Up to the Minute is fronted by a solo anchor. The program is more serious and less irreverent than its main competitor World News Now on ABC.

This 1989 program replaced West 57th and was anchored by Connie Chung. Like West 57th it tried to set itself apart from other newsmagazines by doing things differently. How? In order to enhance the story telling, they used actors to recreate actual events. Critics charged that this blurred the line between news and fiction. The program, at any rate, was not very successful and only had a short run.

This slick newsmagazine was started in 1985 as a 60 Minutes for a younger generation and named after the address of the CBS Broadcast Center in New York. It was fast paced, visually flashy and anchored by Meredith Vieira. The newsmagazine lasted for four years. In 1989 West 57th died because of a lack of resources and Vieira moved to 60 Minutes.

In 1968 legendary broadcast pioneer (and executive producer until 2004), Don Hewitt, created a new kind of television program — the newsmagazine. It was supposed to do feature reporting that was informative and hard hitting. After a less than successful start the program caught on in the 1970′s and has been on top of the yearly Nielsens a total of five times! All the other networks were quick to enter this lucrative business and at times in TV’s history, it seemed there was practically nothing else on but these newsmagazines. In 1998, to cash in more on the success of this show, CBS created 60 Minutes II and, on their short-lived cable network, called Eye on People, they started airing 60 Minutes More. All but the original have since left the air. For this “theme”, you may need to turn up the volume a bit. Alright, it’s nothing more than the sound of an Aristo stopwatch.