Simon Boswell (born 15 October 1953) is an English film score composer, conductor, producer and musician. His body of work includes over 100 credits.
He was nominated for the BAFTA TV Award for Best Original Television Music for the drama series The Lakes, the Anthony Asquith Film Award for Best Original Film Music for the film Hardware and was nominated for a Goya Award for Best Original Score for the film Perdita Durango.
Early life Boswell was born in London in 1953. He studied at The Haberdashers' Aske's Boys' School and English literature at Pembroke College, Cambridge.
Playing the guitar since age 12, he was an accomplished guitarist and was signed by Transatlantic Records in 1975 whilst still at college. This led to the release of his first solo album, "The Mind Parasites", a collection of contemporary acoustic songs and instrumentals.
He formed the band Advertising in 1977. Boswell later became a record producer both in the United Kingdom and Italy. He produced Renato Zero's album and album of Nino Buonocore.
Career Film scoring Boswell's film career started in 1985, and since then he has countless awards from around the world and has been nominated twice for a BAFTA award.
Boswell has also worked on two projects with the Vatican. "Santo Subito" was his first project, which was a film collaboration setting the speeches and the singing of Pope John Paul II to Boswell's music and visuals. Boswell more recently composed for and produced the album "Alma Mater", featuring Pope Benedict XVI.
Television scoring Boswell has composed for BAFTA nominated TV series The Lakes, and collaborated with film-maker Brian Hill and poet Simon Armitage on "Pornography: The Musical" and "Songbirds".
Other music Boswell has worked with musicians from bands such as Blur, Orbital, The Sex Pistols and Echo And The Bunnymen. In 1982 he produced and arranged the album Via Tagliamento 1965-1970 for the Renato Zero. His credits as arranger and producer includes albums by Amii Stewart, Tony Esposito, Tullio De Piscopo and Nino Buonocore.Enzo Giannelli. "Boswell, Simon". Gino Castaldo (edited by). Dizionario della canzone italiana. Curcio Editore, 1990. p. 205.
In Autumn 2006, his album Close Your Eyes was released on his own Flick Records
Quote: "I cut up my previous scores into bits and re-assembled them as new songs mixing full orchestra with musicians from Blur and The Kills and spoken word parts for some of the actors and directors I have worked with along the way – including Ewan McGregor, Ray Winstone, Goran Visnij, Dario Argento and Alejandro Jodorowsky."
Art Boswell continues to work on an art project called BLINK!, an audio-visual installation looped to last forever of portraits extracted from news footage, and individually scored with their own soundtracks. This was first exhibited at the ICA in London in 2002 on 4 simultaneous cinema-sized screens.
Personal life
He married and divorced, having had a son named Jack; he lived with the actress Lysette Anthony and has a son by her, Jimi, born in 2004. In 2008 Jimi was diagnosed with juvenile arthritis. Simon is now married to the contemporary fine artist Lg White who is also the lead singer in his band 'The And', who are performing Simon's film score's Live.
Filmography Film 2013 Ashens and the Quest for the GameChild 2012 The ABCs of Death 2008 My Zinc Bed Bathory Slapper Rovdyr (aka Manhunt - English title) 2006 Free Jimmy Incubus 2005 The River King (Theme) 2004 Churchill: The Hollywood Years In My Father's Den 2003 Summer in the Golden Valley The Sleeping Dictionary Octane (with British electronica band Orbital) 2002 The White Darkness Hypnotic Alien Love Triangle 2001 The Secret Glory 2000 Born Romantic There's Only One Jimmy Grimble Circus 1999 Women Talking Dirty The Debtors A Midsummer Night's Dream This Year's Love The War Zone1998 Cousin Bette Desserts Dad Savage The Fishmonger's Daughter 1997 American Perfekt Photographing Fairies Perdita Durango 1995 Lord of Illusions Hackers 1994 Shallow Grave Burn:Cycle Second Best 1993 Dust Devil 1992 The Crying Game 1990 Hardware Voice of the Moon 1989 Santa Sangre 1988 The Ogre Dinner with a Vampire 1987 Delirium Until Death Graveyard Disturbance Stage Fright 1986 Demoni 2 1985 Phenomena
Television 2007 Tin Man Nearly Famous (6 episodes) Catwalk Dogs 2006 Jackanory (2 episodes) The Magician of Samarkand Muddle Earth 2004 Sea of Souls (2 episodes) 2003 Pornography: The Musical 2002 Widows 2001 Mind Games 2000 Jason and the Argonauts 1999 Tube Tales (segment "Bone") 1998 Killer Net
Discography 2004 In My Father's Den - Music Recordist 2003 Octane - Soundtrack Producer 1999 Women Talking Dirty - Music Arranger The Debtors - Conductor 1998 Cousin Bette - Music Arranger and Producer 1994 Second Best - Music Arranger Burn:Cycle - Soundtrack Producer 1987 Fino alla morte (TV) - Music Arranger
References
External links
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