British film composer George Fenton with the London Symphony Orchestra

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7 June 2009, 7.30pm, Barbican

The world-famous film and television composer George Fenton joins the London Symphony Orchestra for the first time to conduct and present music from his myriad of scores in this exciting concert. Fenton has written music for over 70 feature films, collaborating with some of the most influential directors of the late 20th century. Works to be performed include Cry Freedom, music from the films of Ken Loach, a world concert premier of music from the BBC TV series Planet Earth and the unforgettable music from his award-winning score for The Blue Planet. Since Fenton’s first job as a composer and musical director for an RSC production of Twelfth Night in 1974, he has grown to be one of Britain’s most acclaimed film composers writing music for epics such as Richard Attenborough’s Gandi in 1982, for which he received his first Oscar nomination. Subsequently Fenton has been nominated for four more Oscars for Dangerous Liaisons, Cry Freedom (Best Song and Best Score) and The Fisher King and three Golden Globes: Cry Freedom, and Anna and The King (Best Song and Best Score). He has also received BAFTA and Ivor Novello awards and nominations for television work on productions such as Bergerac, The Jewel in the Crown, The History Man, The Monocled Mutineer, and Life in the Freezer.

Following the broadcast of The Blue Planet in 2001 for which he won Ivor Novello, BAFTA and Emmy awards for Best Television Score, he created the show, Blue Planet Live! which has toured both in the UK and worldwide, performed by many of the world’s leading orchestras. In a five-star review of The Blue Planet Live! the described how:

'Fenton's music was correspondingly amazing. Massive percussion and rending brass for the destructive work of the whales, graceful flutes for the spinning dolphins.... he certainly has fun and it's infectious'.
Fenton has a Royal Television Society Lifetime Achievement Award and is a Fellow of the British Academy of Composers and Songwriters.

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