Mychael Danna
Mychael Danna (born September 20, 1958) is a Canadian film score composer. He won both the Golden Globe and Oscar for Best Original Score for Life of Pi. He has also won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Composition for a Miniseries, Movie or a Special (Original Dramatic Score) in his work on World Without End: Medieval Life and Death Part 1 and 2.
Mychael Danna | |
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 Danna at Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival, Taiwan in 2018. | |
| Background information | |
| Born | September 20, 1958 Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada |
| Origin | Toronto, Ontario, Canada |
| Occupation(s) | Composer |
| Years active | 1987–present |
| Website | www |
Life and career
Danna was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, but his family moved to Burlington, Ontario when he was four weeks old.[1] He is the brother of fellow composer Jeff Danna. He has been scoring films since his 1987 feature debut for Atom Egoyan's Family Viewing, a score which earned Danna the first of his thirteen Genie Award nominations. He has won five times for Achievement in Music - Original Score.[2] Danna is recognized as one of the pioneers of combining non-Western sound sources with orchestral and electronic minimalism in the world of film music. This reputation has led him to work with such directors as Atom Egoyan, Deepa Mehta, Terry Gilliam, Scott Hicks, Ang Lee, Gillies MacKinnon, James Mangold, Mira Nair, Billy Ray, Joel Schumacher, and Denzel Washington. His soundtrack for Ang Lee's Life of Pi earned two Academy Award nominations for Best Original Score and Best Original Song Pi's Lullaby.
He studied music composition at the University of Toronto, winning the Glenn Gould Composition Scholarship in 1985. Danna also served for five years as composer-in-residence at the McLaughlin Planetarium in Toronto (1987–1992). Works for dance include music for Dead Souls (Carbone Quatorze Dance Company, directed by Gilles Maheu 1996), and a score for the Royal Winnipeg Ballet's Gita Govinda (2001) based on the 1000-year-old classical Gita Govinda, with choreographer Nina Menon. In June 2014, Danna was awarded an honorary Doctorate by the University of Toronto, for his career achievements in the field of music.[3]
Family
Danna's wife Aparna is of Indian origin; the couple have two sons. He is the older brother of composer Jeff Danna.
Recent projects
Recent projects include Deepa Mehta's Water, Atom Egoyan's Where the Truth Lies, Terry Gilliam's Tideland, Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris' Little Miss Sunshine, Bennett Miller's Capote, Moneyball and Marc Webb's (500) Days of Summer.
Filmography
References
- "Life of Pi golden for Burlington's Mychael Danna". www.insidehalton.com. Retrieved 2 November 2016.
- "Canada's Awards Database". Academy.ca. 2011-03-28. Archived from the original on 2012-02-05. Retrieved 2012-02-12.
- "Convocation 2014: meet honorary grad Mychael Danna". Retrieved 1 September 2014.
- "Mychael Danna to Score Wally Pfister's 'Transcendence'". Film Music Reporter. December 19, 2013. Retrieved December 20, 2013.
- "Mychael & Jeff Danna to Score 'The Breadwinner'". Film Music Reporter. Film Music Reporter. 2 June 2017. Retrieved 7 July 2017.
Further reading
- Coleman, Lindsay (2017). "Mychael Danna Interview". In Coleman, Lindsay; Tillman, Joakim (eds.). Contemporary Film Music: Investigating Cinema Narratives and Composiiton. Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 187–193. doi:10.1057/978-1-137-57375-9_12.
- Golub, Peter; Jarzebowski, Katy (2017). "Mychael Danna: Music as Metaphor". In Coleman, Lindsay; Tillman, Joakim (eds.). Contemporary Film Music: Investigating Cinema Narratives and Composiiton. Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 195–219. doi:10.1057/978-1-137-57375-9_13.
External links
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