John Powell

John Powell has composed a series of acclaimed motion picture soundtracks since arriving in America seven years ago. He composed the score for John Woo’s Face/Off and co-wrote the score for Antz as well as Chicken Run and Shrek. He was the creative force behind scores for Forces of Nature and Endurance, and recently composed the score for I Am Sam. His score for The Bourne Identity starring Matt Damon received rave reviews.

Powell was a classical music aficionado until 13, when he began playing everything from rock ‘n roll to jazz. In 1986 he exchanged the violin for the viola to gain entrance to London’s Trinity College of Music, where he studied composition, earning the John Halford and the Boosey and Hawkes Bursary Music College Prizes. In 1988, he landed a job composing music for commercials and television at London’s Air-Edel Music. There he worked alongside composers Hans Zimmer and Patrick Doyle and made his first foray into feature films, assisting Doyle with the score of Into the West and writing cues and working as an electronic music programmer for Zimmer on White Fang.

Powell left Air-Edel in 1995 to co-found, with Garvin Greenaway, London-based commercial music house Independently Thinking Music (ITM). Together they scored more than 100 advertising campaigns for clients such as Coca-Cola, BMW and Sega. ITM also collaborated with Paris-based music house Vol de Nuit, composing music for French commercials and independent films.

Arriving in the States in 1997, he wrote additional music for Hans Zimmer for The Thin Red Line and arranged songs composed by Stephen Schwartz for Prince of Egypt. His musical diversity was proved by scores for the comedies Evolution and Rat Race. Most recently, John scored two holiday movies that proved to be box-offices successes: Drumline and the Sandra Bullock/Hugh Grant release Two Weeks Notice. Upcoming films include The Italian Job, starring Mark Wahlberg, Charlize Theron and Edward Norton.