| Nathan Kelly | |
|---|---|
| Birth name | Nathan Christopher Kelly |
| Origin | Houston, Texas, USA |
| Occupations | composer |
| Years active | 2005–present |
| Website | www.nathankelly.com |
Nathan Kelly is an American composer in Los Angeles, best known for working as an orchestrator for Broadway productions such as Gypsy, Curtains, The Tony Awards, and Séance on a Wet Afternoon.[1] His work has been eclectic, orchestrating many different styles of music. His modern scores are known for their keyboard writing for the orchestra pit, and their balance between acoustic and synthesised sounds.[2]
Contents |
Kelly studied music composition at the University of Texas (bachelors), film scoring at the University of Southern California, and took further education at the Juilliard School of Music, Tanglewood, Massachusetts, Aspen Music School, Atlantic Center for the Arts, Bowdoin, Maine, and the Pacific Northwest Film Scoring Program, Seattle.[3] While in school, he performed on the Piano with dance bands, and some of these jazz and pop elements can be heard in his arrangements for Broadway and record albums. His composition teachers were Tobias Picker and film composer Bruce Broughton.[1][4]
In the early 2000s, Kelly began his career as an intern at Walt Disney Music Studios[5] in Kissimmee, Florida writing arrangements for the bands at Walt Disney World and proofreading.[6] After graduating college, he moved to New York City and interned for the Oprah Winfrey Broadway musical The Color Purple.[7][7] There, he met eminent orchestrator Jonathan Tunick and became his only student.[6] During this time, he worked as a pianist playing in the orchestra pit of The Phantom of the Opera, The Wedding Singer, The Little Mermaid, Me & My Girl, Beauty and the Beast, Grease, Altar Boyz, Forbidden Broadway, Happy Days, Radio City Music Hall, and Thrill Me.[2][8] He also accompanied American Ballet Theatre, The Joffrey Ballet, The Rockettes, and Royal Caribbean Cruise Line tours around the world.[9] He then focused on orchestration, producing scores for Lea Salonga, Sarah Brightman, Audra McDonald, and record albums for Radio Disney, Dionne Warwick, and the television show That's So Raven.[8][10][11]
Kelly has acted as composer-in-residence at eight institutions in the United States: Ucross Foundation,[12] Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts,[13][14][14] Atlantic Center for the Arts,[15] Academy of Music in Paris, Hambidge, Woodstock, Banff Music Centre, Helene Wurlitzer and Headlands Center for the Arts.[16] His symphonic works have been premiered by the Orchestre de Paris, Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra,[17] Knox-Galesburg Symphony,[18] the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. Kelly has also collaborated with conductors such as André Previn[19][20] and Randol Alan Bass.[5].
In 2010, Kelly moved to Los Angeles and attended the Scoring for Motion Pictures and Television program at the University of Southern California,[21] and was mentored by the film composer Thomas Newman.[21] In 2011, Kelly won the American Composers Orchestra composition contest from a national call for scores,[17] and was a finalist in the Morton Gould Young Composers Contest.[22] He was featured in ASCAP's "Playback" magazine.[6] He was also selected to participate in the ASCAP/NYU and ASCAP/LA workshops for film composers.[23] He is currently commissioned to compose a Harp Concerto for the Dallas Metropolitan Winds, Symphony No. 2 for Oslo Symphony, and a ballet for the Blue Lake Ballet.[5][5]