HARRY GREGSON-WILLIAMS is one of Hollywood’s most sought-after and prolific composers whose long list of film and television credits underscore the diverse range of his talents. He has received the BMI Icon Award in recognition of his unique and indelible influence on generations of music makers, and was awarded the prestigious Ambassador Award by the Society of Composers & Lyricists. Born in England to a musical family, Gregson-Williams earned a choral scholarship to St. John’s College, Cambridge, at the age of 7 and later gained a coveted spot at London’s Guildhall School of Music & Drama, from which he recently received an honorary fellowship. He started his film career as assistant to composer Richard Harvey and later as orchestrator and arranger for Stanley Myers, and went on to compose his first scores for director Nicolas Roeg. His subsequent collaboration and friendship with composer Hans Zimmer led to Gregson-Williams providing music for such films as “The Rock,” “Armageddon” and “The Prince of Egypt” and helped launch his career in Hollywood.
Upcoming projects for Gregson-Williams include Gladiator II directed by Ridley Scott which stars Paul Mescal and Pedro Pascal and is scheduled for release on November 22, 2024. Cinematic releases for 2023 include “Meg 2: The Trench” starring Jason Statham and directed by Ben Wheatley, the thriller “Retribution” starring Liam Neeson directed by Nimród Antal, and the upcoming Aardman’s animated feature “Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget” directed by Sam Fell which debuted on Netflix in December 2023. Other recent scores include “The Last Duel” and “House of Gucci” both directed by Ridley Scott as well as Disney’s live action feature film “Mulan” directed by Niki Caro, with whom he had worked previously when scoring her Holocaust drama “The Zookeeper’s Wife.” Gregson-Williams and his brother teamed up to write the score for the HBO drama series “The Gilded Age” which debuted in 2022 and wrote the music for Season 2 which premiered on October 29, 2023. He also collaborated with his friend, composer Mychael Danna, for the documentary “Return to Space” directed by Oscar-winning directors Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin receiving Emmy nominations for their work.
Gregson-Williams was the composer on all four installments of the animated blockbuster “Shrek” franchise, garnering a BAFTA Award nomination for the score for the Oscar-winning “Shrek.” He received Golden Globe and Grammy Award nominations for his score for Andrew Adamson’s “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.” He has collaborated multiple times with a number of directors, including Ben Affleck on “Live by Night,” “The Town” and “Gone Baby Gone”; Joel Schumacher on “Twelve,” “The Number 23,” “Veronica Guerin” and “Phone Booth”; Tony Scott on “Unstoppable,” “The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3,” “Déjà Vu,” “Domino,” “Man on Fire,” “Spy Game” and “Enemy of the State”; Ridley Scott on “The Martian,” “Prometheus,” “Exodus: Gods and Kings,” “Kingdom of Heaven,” “The Last Duel” and “House of Gucci”; Bille August on “Return to Sender” and “Smilla’s Sense of Snow”; Andrew Adamson on the “Shrek” series, the first two “Narnia” movies and “Mr. Pip”; as well as with Antoine Fuqua on “The Replacement Killers,” “The Equalizer,” The Equalizer 2” and “Infinite.” Some of his other recent film projects include Disney Nature’s feature film “Polar Bear”, and “The Ambush” directed by Pierre Morel, “Life in a Day 2020” directed Kevin Macdonald, “The Meg” directed by Jon Turteltaub, Aardman’s “Early Man” directed by Nick Park for which he received an Annie Award nomination and Disney Nature’s “Penguins.” His television credits include “Whiskey Cavalier,” the miniseries “Catch-22” for George Clooney and two episodes of the anthology series “Philip K. Dick’s Electric Dreams” for which he received an Emmy nomination for the episode titled “The Commuter.”
Gregson-Williams has scored three of the five games in the highly successful “Metal Gear Solid” franchise for Konami and scored “Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare” for Activision, which became the top-selling video game of 2014 and earned him various music gaming awards. Throughout his career, Gregson-Williams has collaborated with a diverse array of recording artists such as Regina Spektor, Imogen Heap, Tricky, Peter Murphy, Flea, Hybrid, Paul Oakenfold, Sasha, Trevor Horn, Trevor Rabin, Lebo M., Perry Farrell and Tony Visconti and most recently Gregson-Williams co-wrote the original song “Loyal Brave True” for “Mulan” performed by Christina Aguilera.