Murray Gold

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Murray Gold

Background information
Birth name Murray Gold
Born 1969
Portsmouth, England
Years active 1994-present
Label(s) Silva Screen

Murray Gold (born 1969, Portsmouth, England)[1] is a British composer for stage, film, and television and a dramatist for both theatre and radio.

Contents

[edit] Television

Gold has been nominated for a BAFTA four times in the category Best Original Television Music, for Vanity Fair (1999), Queer as Folk (2000), Casanova (2006) and Doctor Who (2008). His score for the BAFTA winning film Kiss of Life was awarded the 'Mozart Prize of the 7th Art' by a French jury at Aubagne in 2003. He has also been nominated four times by the Royal Television Society in categories relating to music for television.[1]

He has worked with Russell T Davies, writer and executive producer of Doctor Who, many times in the past on projects such as Casanova (starring David Tennant), The Second Coming (starring Christopher Eccleston) and Queer as Folk 1 & 2.[1] He has also provided the incidental music for the 2000s version of Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) alongside James Bond composer David Arnold, who provided the theme tune. None of his incidental music was released on the soundtrack CD for that show.

He wrote the theme tune for the Channel 4 series Shameless.

[edit] Doctor Who and related series

Since 2005, Gold has served as musical director for the new series of Doctor Who for the BBC. In this capacity, he created a new arrangement of the show's theme (originally composed by Ron Grainer) and also composes the show's incidental music. Silva Screen released Gold's Doctor Who incidental music from the first and second series on December 11, 2006. A second CD, featuring music from the show's third series, was released on November 5th. [2] He has also been seen very briefly in the show itself, making a cameo appearance (and wearing a false mustache) in the 2007 Christmas special "Voyage of the Damned".[3]

Gold's initial arrangement of the Doctor Who theme did not include "middle eight" portion originally used in the theme, although he later reinstated it for a rearrangement of the theme introduced in the series' 2005 Christmas episode and subsequently used in the 2006 series of the programme.

Although his music for the 2005 series of Doctor Who relied largely on sampled sounds, his later arrangements for the show, beginning with "The Christmas Invasion", have been more orchestral, often being recorded by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, supplemented by vocal performances with Melanie Pappenheim and others.[4]. By contrast, music for the classic 1963-1989 series of Doctor Who, as produced by the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, Mark Ayres et al., generally had an electronic feel, with innovative but limited instrumentation.[5]

Gold also wrote the theme tunes for Doctor Who spin-offs The Sarah Jane Adventures and Torchwood, and composes music for the latter series alongside Ben Foster. He arranged the theme tunes to Totally Doctor Who and Doctor Who Confidential, both of which are variations on the Doctor Who theme.

[edit] Film, stage and radio

Gold has scored a number of British and American films, most recently Death at a Funeral directed by Frank Oz and Mischief Night, directed by Penny Woolcock.[1]

His radio play Electricity was awarded the Michael Imison award for best new play after its broadcast on Radio 3 in 2001. It subsequently transferred to the West Yorkshire Playhouse in 2004 and was performed with Christopher Eccleston in the lead role. Others of his plays include 50 Revolutions performed by the Oxford Stage Company at the Whitehall Theatre, London in 2000 and Resolution at Battersea Arts Centre in 1994.

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b c d Murray Gold (composer bio). Manners McDade Artist Management. Manners McDade & McCleery Music Ltd (2007). Retrieved on 2007-10-14.
  2. ^ Doctor Who - Series 3. Silva Screen Records (2007-10-10). Retrieved on 2007-10-10.
  3. ^ Doctor Who - Fact File - Voyage of the Damned. BBC (2007-12-25). Retrieved on 2007-12-26.
  4. ^ Russell, Gary (2006). Doctor Who: The Inside Story. London: BBC Books, 129-132. ISBN ISBN 0-563-48649-X. 
  5. ^ Brown, Mick (1979). Music Ex Machina. Radio Times, reprinted on mb21 web site. Mike Brown. Retrieved on 2007-10-14.