NAME:
Jonny Greenwood
ABOUT
Jonny Greenwood is best known for being the lead guitarist and multi-intstrumentalist in the band Radiohead and more latterly in The Smile. Radiohead have had phenomenal critical acclaim and huge popularity throughout their thirty year career, earning multi-platinum record sales along the way, and the signs are that The Smile too are destined for great success. But Jonny’s musical passions extend far beyond ‘rock’ music. He has an extensive back catalogue of classical pieces, film soundtrack and traditional middle eastern folk music.
Jonny has always had a deep love for classical music. He has always held a fascination for Messiaen and Ligeti, for instance and indeed his first foray into music was as a young viola player, soon leading him on to mastering piano, recorder, harmonica and the ondes Martenot.
Jonny has penned a number of classical pieces including; smear (two ondes Martenot and ensemble, premiered at the FuseLeeds festival in 2004 and then performed by the London Sinfonietta at the Royal Festival Hall in 2005); Popcorn Superhet Receiver (as the then BBC Composer in Residence, Jonny composed this piece for string orchestra, it was premiered by the BBC Concert Orchestra and Robert Ziegler in 2005); Doghouse (string trio and large orchestra, again premiered by the BBC Concert Orchestra and Ziegler, 2010) and 48 Responses to Polymorphia (48 strings, 2011), Water (chamber orchestra, a commission by the Australian Chamber Orchestra, was toured worldwide by them in 2014) and Horror vacui (solo violin and 68 strings, again commissioned by the BBC and was premiered at the BBC Proms by Daniel Pioro with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, BBC Proms Youth Ensemble and Hugh Brunt in 2019, winning the Ivors Composer Award for Large Scale Composition).
Sections of Popcorn Superhet Receiver were reworked for the soundtrack of the Oscar winning Paul Thomas Anderson film There Will Be Blood (2007). Jonny won Best Film Score at the Evening Standard British Film Awards, and Critics’ Choice Award for Best Composer by the Broadcast Film Critics Association of the USA, both in 2007. Other film scores composed by Jonny include Norwegian Wood (Tran Anh Hung, 2010); We Need To Talk About Kevin (Lynn Ramsey, 2011); The Master, Inherent Vice, Phantom Thread (all Paul Thomas Anderson, 2012, 2014, 2017 respectively); The Power Of The Dog (Jane Campion 2021).
Jonny’s most recent work, Jarak Qaribak (2023) is an exploration of traditional Arabic folk music, a collaboration with Dudu Tassa.
ExpandJonny has always had a deep love for classical music. He has always held a fascination for Messiaen and Ligeti, for instance and indeed his first foray into music was as a young viola player, soon leading him on to mastering piano, recorder, harmonica and the ondes Martenot.
Jonny has penned a number of classical pieces including; smear (two ondes Martenot and ensemble, premiered at the FuseLeeds festival in 2004 and then performed by the London Sinfonietta at the Royal Festival Hall in 2005); Popcorn Superhet Receiver (as the then BBC Composer in Residence, Jonny composed this piece for string orchestra, it was premiered by the BBC Concert Orchestra and Robert Ziegler in 2005); Doghouse (string trio and large orchestra, again premiered by the BBC Concert Orchestra and Ziegler, 2010) and 48 Responses to Polymorphia (48 strings, 2011), Water (chamber orchestra, a commission by the Australian Chamber Orchestra, was toured worldwide by them in 2014) and Horror vacui (solo violin and 68 strings, again commissioned by the BBC and was premiered at the BBC Proms by Daniel Pioro with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, BBC Proms Youth Ensemble and Hugh Brunt in 2019, winning the Ivors Composer Award for Large Scale Composition).
Sections of Popcorn Superhet Receiver were reworked for the soundtrack of the Oscar winning Paul Thomas Anderson film There Will Be Blood (2007). Jonny won Best Film Score at the Evening Standard British Film Awards, and Critics’ Choice Award for Best Composer by the Broadcast Film Critics Association of the USA, both in 2007. Other film scores composed by Jonny include Norwegian Wood (Tran Anh Hung, 2010); We Need To Talk About Kevin (Lynn Ramsey, 2011); The Master, Inherent Vice, Phantom Thread (all Paul Thomas Anderson, 2012, 2014, 2017 respectively); The Power Of The Dog (Jane Campion 2021).
Jonny’s most recent work, Jarak Qaribak (2023) is an exploration of traditional Arabic folk music, a collaboration with Dudu Tassa.