David L. Snell (10 September 1897 – 27 March 1967) was a pianist, conductor, composer and music director.

In November 1938 Franz Waxman had just five days to put together the fifty-minute score for A Christmas Carol so it could be released in time for the holiday season.

[4] Snell wrote music for many full-length films, shorts and B-movie series such as Dr. Kildare, Maisie and The Thin Man.

[1] Snell's scores often showed first-rate craftmanship, but his work has generally been ignored, perhaps because in most cases he chose to simply underscore the dialog as opposed to contributing complementary musical ideas.

[5] However, for the 1947 Lady in the Lake, based on the Raymond Chandler novel and set around Christmas time, Snell chose to use a choir singing a cappella without musical accompaniment, providing an austere and effective "black and white" score to accompany the stark black and white cinematography.