1970s — Funky Cop Themes & New Hollywood

About the 1970s in screen music

Funk and disco invade prime time. Quincy Jones, Mike Post, Lalo Schifrin, and Henry Mancini reshape the cop-show, detective, and adventure-show theme around clavinets, wah-wah guitars, and fender Rhodes pianos. Meanwhile, John Williams reinvents orchestral film scoring with Star Wars, Jaws, and the Indiana Jones franchise.

This page collects every 1970s theme profile catalogued in Ringtone Barn, alongside related public-domain ringtone downloads from the same era. The original network and label master recordings of these themes are usually still under active copyright; the Ringtone Barn archive provides historical context, install instructions, and stylistically related public-domain audio you can legally download and use as a phone ringtone.

Iconic 1970s Composers

Composers who shaped the 1970s theme-music landscape include — among many others — the working studio writers who scored network television and the major-studio film composers whose work defined the cinematic side of the decade. To browse by individual composer, see the full composer index.

Installing a 1970s theme as a ringtone

The technical workflow is the same regardless of the source: get a clean MP3 file under 30 seconds, then either run it through GarageBand to produce an M4R for iPhone or drop it into the Ringtones folder on Android. Step-by-step instructions are at iPhone via GarageBand and Android via Files App.