John Greenwood (composer)

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John Darnfort Herman Greenwood (born June 26, 1889 in London , United Kingdom , † April 15, 1975 in Ditchling , East Sussex , United Kingdom) was a British composer and film composer .

Live and act

Education and career

Born in London with British, German and New Zealand roots, he attended the Royal College of Music in his hometown , where he received artistic instruction on the viola and horn. Soon after, John Greenwood began composing a wide variety of pieces of music, including piano, orchestral and chamber music. After the emergence of the sound film, he was hired by Julius Hagen Productions as a film composer in 1929, and later he also added music to films from larger production companies. During the Second World War , Greenwood served at the BBC European Service as assistant to the musical direction and later also conducted the Sound Orchestra of the same station.

Compositions for the film

He became known in 1934 for the background music for the Philosemitic Feuchtwanger film adaptation Jud Süß and for the award-winning documentary The Men of Aran ; This was followed by compositions for works by Alfred Hitchcock ( secret agent ) and the brothers Alexander Korda and Zoltan Korda ( The Elephant Boy and Danger on the Doro Pass ) by 1939 . During the Second World War, commissioned compositions for a number of ambitious anti-Nazi propaganda films (partly produced by Leslie Howard ) such as Nine Men, Pimpernel Smith , The Gentle Sex , The Holy Fire and San Demetrio followed . Even after the war ended in 1945, Greenwood was busy. His contributions to the ambitious episode films Quartet and So ist das Leben are particularly noteworthy . In 1953, John Greenwood ended his film career.

Filmography

literature

  • Jürgen Wölfer, Roland Löper: The great lexicon of film composers, Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2003, p. 205

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Greenwood, John
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Greenwood, John Darnfort Herman (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British composer and film composer
DATE OF BIRTH June 26, 1889
PLACE OF BIRTH London , UK
DATE OF DEATH April 15, 1975
Place of death Ditchling , East Sussex