Mark Russell is a renowned British composer. His recent projects include BBC’s Biff & Chip season 1 & 2, three series of Free Rein for Lime Pictures, The Worst Witch series 1-4 co-produced by the BBC, ZDF and Netflix, two series of Disney’s The Evermoor Chronicles, Castles In The Sky, a BBC film starring Eddie Izzard and Laura Fraser, the BBC mini-series Rocket’s Island, series 6 & 7 of the BBC’s Inspector George Gently, and Series 10 to 19 of the long running hit genealogy documentary Who Do You Think You Are. Prior to this Mark created a wonderfully inventive and dynamic score for the high concept conspiracy thriller feature, Event 15 from Ipso Facto Films, as well as Kindle Entertainment’s very popular, The Life and Adventures of Nick Nickleby for the BBC. Mark composed a beautifully touching score for the BBC’s Best Of Men, (for which he was nominated for an RTS Award for Best Music 2012), which told the incredible story of the founding of the Paralympics – starring Eddie Marsan, Rob Brydon and Niamh Cusack. Mark’s score for the hugely successful Kindle Entertainment series Leonardo, gained him a nomination for best TV music at 2012’s Ivor Novello Awards and won him the award for Best Music at the Kidscreen New York 2012 Awards.
Mark Russell’s first drama work included his BAFTA nominated score to the hugely popular ITV series ‘Cold Feet’. His music for the Fine Line Movie ‘Saving Grace’ (a US Top Ten Hit) brought him attention on both sides of the Atlantic, and his soundtracks for two big budget Movies, ‘Summer Things’ (starring Charlotte Rampling) and ‘L’ex Femme de Ma Vie’ (including a title song with Jane Birkin) introduced him into the rarified world of French Film. He’s an extremely experienced dramatic composer equally at home with the Orchestra or with cutting edge electronics and samples. He works from his purpose-built studio in Oxford.
Mark Russell was a boy chorister at St Paul’s Cathedral and went on to read music at York University. As a session keyboard player, he toured the world with Tanita Tikaram, Julia Fordham and the Chinese flautist, Guo Yue. After composing for many film and TV Commercials, Mark went on to score documentaries and dramas, including ‘Spiderman’ for Radio 1 in collaboration with Queen guitarist Brian May.
Mark Russell scored 3 series of Kingdom for Parallel Pictures/ITV, starring Stephen Fry as a Norfolk solicitor. Further projects include Reunited for BBC1 and Love At First Sight, a short film starring John Hurt and Phyllida Law. Mark most recently completed scoring March Of The Dinosaurs, an epic CGI feature from Wide-Eyed Entertainment, the makers of Walking With Dinosaurs, and Leonardo for Kindle Entertainment/CBBC.
For the summer of 2007, Mark relocated to Los Angeles to work with Rupert Gregson-Williams on Jerry Seinfeld’s Dreamworks animation, ‘Bee Movie’. He then went onto score Andrew Lang’s award-winning feature, Sons Of Cuba.
Aside from composing, Mark has written an acclaimed book ‘Film Music’ (published by Rotovision), and for 17 years co-presented BBC Radio 3’s cult eclectic weekly music show ‘Mixing It’. The show reflected his wide musical interests; everything from Medieval to the latest electronic/jazz/rock sounds.
