Kenneth Lauren Burns was born on the 29th of July 1953 in Brooklyn, New York. His mother Lyla Smith worked as a biotechnician while his father Robert Kyle Burns Jr. studied cultural anthropology at Columbia University.
Fiddler Jay Ungar performed the distinctive violin melody called Ashokan Farewell specifically for the film to sum up all the pathos of that great struggle. Burns frequently incorporates simple musical leitmotifs or melodies into his productions to enhance emotional impact.
He gives life to still photographs by slowly zooming out subjects of interest and panning from one subject to another using a rostrum camera technique. Apple named this method the Ken Burns effect in iPhoto and Final Cut Pro X programs after he initially declined commercial endorsements.
Burns received fifteen Emmy Awards including Outstanding Informational Series for Baseball in 1995 and Outstanding Non-fiction Series recognition for The National Parks in 2010. He also earned two Grammy Awards for The Civil War and was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 1991.
In 1976 Burns founded Florentine Films alongside college classmate Roger Sherman and photographer Elaine Mayes who named the company after her hometown of Florence Massachusetts. Buddy Squires joined them one year later as a founding member while Lawrence Larry Hott became the fourth partner despite not matriculating at Hampshire College.