ASCAP HONORS FILM, TV COMPOSERS

Among the winners at this year’s ASCAP Screen Music Awards were Hans Zimmer, This is Us composer Siddhartha Khosla, Bear McCreary and Rocket Man’s Matthew Margeson. The awards, complete with acceptance speeches and interviews, were handed out virtually from 6/25 to 6/28.

Composer Michael Abels, a Top Box Office Film winner for Us, spoke with Starr Parodi, President of the Alliance for Women Film Composers about championing diversity and fairness for film/TV composers for ASCAP Experience: Home Edition: “People will say it’s a pipeline problem. They want to be diverse but they just don’t know anyone... So we decided to fix the doorbell. We now have the Composers Diversity Collective website."

In his acceptance speech for writing music to Surviving R. Kelly, Nathan Matthew David said, "We need more voices of color, not just in front of the camera, but behind the camera as well.” He goes on to dedicate the award to his parents who came to the U.S. from the Philippines “with nothing in their pockets but dreams.”

John Powell received the ASCAP Screen Composer's Choice: 2019 Film Score of the Year for his work on How To Train Your Dragon: Hidden World. Gordy Haab received the Composer's Choice: Video Game Score of the Year Award for Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order.

Full list of winners can be found here.