Nitin Sawhneyo

Report as inappropriate Your report has been received

Shared by: wuyunyi

Tags

Stats

views:: 2
posted:: 4/15/2011
language:: English
pages:: 3

Public Domain

Document Sample

C/O Abbey Road Studios, 3 Abbey Road
( hot,haus) n. an environment that encourages rapid development London NW8 9AY, United Kingdom
tel +44 (0) 20 7446 7446
fax +44 (0) 20 7446 7448
email info@hot-house-music.com
web www.hot-house-music.com

Nitin Sawhneyº
It would be easier to jot down what this man can t do than what he can
The Guardian, London, UK

There is no disputing the fact that Nitin Sawhney is widely regarded as one of the most influential and
versatile creative talents alive today. Firmly established as a world-class producer, songwriter, DJ, multi-
instrumentalist, orchestral composer, and cultural pioneer, Sawhney has become a latter-day Renaissance
man in the worlds of music, film, videogames, dance and theatre.

To date, Sawhney has scored over forty films, as well as having scored TV ads for top international
agencies. His music for Channel Four s Second Generation saw him nominated for the prestigious Ivor
Novello Award for Film and TV Composition (2004), and his scores have accompanied everything from dark,
high-tension drama to light-hearted animatronics. Known for his incredible degree of versatility Sawhney
has established himself as one of the world s leading composers for film, and has acted as a judge for
BAFTA, BIFA and The Ivor Novello Awards. Works include orchestral scores for Mira Nair s The Namesake,
Sony Playstation 3 s Heavenly Sword, and Franz Osten s silent film classic, A Throw of Dice, which he
wrote for the London Symphony Orchestra and Henrique Goldman s Jean Charles, on the life of Jean-
Charles de Menezes. In production, amidst touring with his band and orchestras around the world, Sawhney
will be scoring The Fifth Beatle, on the life of Beatles manager, Brian Epstein and The Lodger one of
Hitchcock s very early silent films. He has recently finished composing the score for Ninja Theory s follow
up game development to Heavenly Sword, Enslaved along with a major 8 part TV series for the BBC called
Human Planet which aired on BBC One in January 2011.

Now signed to Universal Music Publishing Ltd, Sawhney has released 8 studio albums each one garnering
critical acclaim. Indeed, Sawhney has received no less than 15 major national awards for his work.
London s Outcaste Records released the breakthrough Gold selling Beyond Skin in 99, which took a
prestigious Technics Mercury Music Prize nomination and won Sawhney the coveted South Bank Show
Award. Subsequently, Sawhney signed a multiple album deal to Richard Branson s V2 Records, and
released the millennial epic and Silver certified Prophesy in 2001, winning a MOBO Award as well as a BBC
Radio 3 Music Award. Sawhney s seventh studio album, Philtre, was released in May 2005, winning another
BBC Radio 3 Award. In 2008 Sawhney recorded his eighth album, London Undersound, which features
performances from Paul McCartney, Anoushka Shankar, Natty and Imogen Heap amongst others and
specially contributed artwork from Antony Gormley. Clubland has seen three international album releases
by Sawhney: All Mixed Up the definitive remix collection, FabricLive.15, and In the Mind of .Nitin
Sawhney. He has toured each of his albums extensively and has sold-out many of the world s most
prestigious venues both as a band and DJ. Sawhney has worked with a host of artists including Sting, Paul
McCartney, Sinead O Connor, A R Rahman, Jeff Beck, Brian Eno, Fink, Taio Cruz and Will Young. In 2007
Sawhney co-produced the sophomore album for Atlantic Records artist Get Cape.Wear Cape.Fly.

An acclaimed flamenco guitarist and classical/jazz pianist, Sawhney s musical ability to transcend cultural
barriers has also gained him much recognition within the classical community. In 2006 Sawhney composed
a 1hr 20-minute symphony to accompany A Throw of Dice, which premiered with the London Symphony
Orchestra at the Barbican, London and has subsequently toured globally with international orchestras. He
has also worked with the BBC Concert Orchestra on Natural World Symphony, and the London Philharmonia
on The Namesake. In 2004, Sawhney was commissioned by the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and
the Britten Sinfonia to compose several new performance works. Other past commissions include 2000 s
Urban Prophecies for BBC Proms, 2001 s Neural Circuits for the Britten Sinfonia and leading British pianist,
Joanna MacGregor, and a commissioned concert for 2006 Electric Proms. 2007 s BBC Proms featured a
retrospective of Nitin Sawhney s works by way of a sold-out groundbreaking orchestral performance at the
Royal Albert Hall where 2008 saw Sawhney perform to another sell-out audience at London s Roudhouse for
a televised broadcast through the BBC Electric Proms, making him the only artist to perform at and sell-out
both BBC Proms events in his own right. Last year Sawhney curated an Indian festival at Sadler s Wells
Theatre, London with Akram Khan where they both performed individually and jointly during the festival
period in November 2009. Together they created an innovative new piece, Confluence, which was
performed at the festival and was recently revisited in July 2010. The piece will be performed at the
Luminato Festival in June 2011. Also in 2009, cementing his relationship with London s premier orchestra,
Sawhney played with his band and key string players from the LSO at St Lukes in London before going on to
perform the score he composed for the Japanese silent movie, Yogoto No Yume, with the LSO at the
Barbican, London in March 2010. Recently Nitin engaged in scoring and directing a production,
Entanglement, at the Royal Opera House, London, he also scored for Akram Khan s latest production,
Vertical Road which premiered at Sadler s Wells and is now touring world-wide. Vertical Road has recently
won an award in Melbourne, Australia for best new work . Sawhney is currently working on ideas and
tracks for his ninth studio album.

In 2000 Sawhney produced the Varekai album for Cirque du Soleil, taking his unique sound to an even-
wider audience. In 2002 he worked with Akram Khan and Anish Kapoor, scoring the music to Khan s
critically acclaimed choreographed work Kaash, and also wrote the music for Khan s Zero Degrees
(nominated for a Laurence Olivier Award, designed by Antony Gormley, and most importantly winning
Sawhney a New York Performance and Dance award for best score). Sawhney also scored Khan s latest
work, Bahok, for the Royal Ballet of China. Recent works in theatre include Simon McBurney s Olivier
award-winning A Disappearing Number for Complicite, the Mahabharata adaptation by Olivier award-
winning writer Stephen Clarke and Jonathan Holmes Fallujah.

Much of Sawhney s attention remains focused on the areas of education and community building,
accepting the role of Artist in Residence for no less than 5 separate performing arts organisations around
the world. Sawhney joined Sir George Martin as a patron for the British Government s Access-to-Music
program and is also patron of the Raindance East Film Festival and the British Independent Film Awards.
Sawhney appears regularly as an arts and current affairs commentator on topical discussion and news
programs such as the BBC s Newsnight, Newsnight Review, and HardTalk. He has also written for UK
national broadsheets: The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph, The Independent, and The Observer. In 2006
Sawhney was awarded an Honorary Graduate Degree from London s South Bank University and in late 2007
was awarded an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Music from the University of Kent along with a fellowship of
Paul McCartney s LIPA. Sawhney also received no less than three further university doctorates respectively
from the universities of Sussex, Roehampton and Staffordshire in 2009 and in 2010 Sawhney was appointed
Associate Artist at Sadler s Wells.

Film Credits
JEAN CHARLES | dir. Henrique Goldman
Mango Films
THE FIFTH BEATLE | dir. Vivek Tiwary
Tiwary Entertainment Group
THE NAMESAKE | dir. Mira Nair
Fox Searchlight
THROW OF DICE | dir. Franz Osten
Silent film from 1929 scored by Nitin Sawhney
Toured with the BBC Concert Orchestra
HARI OM | dir. Bharat Bala
Tricolor Films
LILA SAYS | dir. Ziad Doueri
Samuel Goldwyn Films
ANITA AND ME | dir. Metin Husseyin
BBC Films
PURE | dir. Gilles MacKinnon
Little Wing Films
SPLIT WIDE OPEN | dir. Dev Benegal
Tropic Films
ANGELL S HELL | dir. Metin Husseyin
Film for ITV
FLIGHT | dir. Alex Pillai
Hindi Films for BBC
THE SIKHS
BBC Films

Film Documentary/Short Film Credits
STILL THE CHILDREN ARE HERE | dir. Mira Nair
Mirabai Films
CORRIENTES DEL PASSADO | dir. Antonio Palomares
Short
THE DANCE OF SHIVA | dir. Jamie Payne
Epiphany Productions - Short
feat. Kenneth Branagh & Samuel West
SURVIVING SABU | dir. Ian Igbal Rashid
Frameline Productions Ltd. Short