Howard Goodall

Biography

Almost everyone knows at least one of Howard Goodall's popular TV themes for Blackadder, Mr Bean, Red Dwarf, The Catherine Tate Show, Q.I. or The Vicar of Dibley. Other television scores include The Borrowers and his BAFTA-nominated The Gathering Storm. In the theatre his musicals have been performed throughout the world. The Hired Man, which he wrote with Melvyn Bragg in 1984, won The Ivor Novello Award for Best Musical (1985), 4 Olivier Award nominations, in Holland a John Kraaijkamp Musical Award (2001), 7 Waterford International Musical Festival awards and in 2004 the TMA Award for Best Musical. Girlfriends (1986) was premiered in London's West End in 1987 and in the USA in May 2003. Days of Hope (1990) was a co-production of Hampstead Theatre and the Oxford Stage Company, Silas Marner was commissioned by the 1993 Salisbury Festival and subsequently revived by the City of Birmingham Touring Opera. The Kissing-Dance (1999) and The Dreaming (2001) were both commissioned by the National Youth Music Theatre and toured extensively after seasons at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden's Linbury Theatre. A Winter's Tale was premiered at the Sage Gateshead in December 2005, Two Cities at Salisbury Playhouse in September 2006. He is a prodigious writer of choral music and has contributed songs to several platinum-selling CDs. In Memoriam Anne Frank was performed at the first National Holocaust Memorial concert in January 2001, O Lord God of Time and Eternity at the 2003 Service of Remembrance for the Iraq war in St Paul's Cathedral, and his settings of Psalm 23 and Love Divine are amongst the most performed of all contemporary choral works.

In June 2004 his Jason and the Argonauts for organ, narrator, tenor and percussion opened the newly-refurbished organ of the Royal Albert Hall.

As well as presenting the BBC's Choir of the Year, Chorister of the Year and Young Musician of the Year, he has written and presented his own highly-acclaimed music documentaries for Channel 4. Howard Goodall's Organ Works won him an RTS Award in 1998, Howard Goodall's Choir Works (1998) was nominated for Best Music Programme at the 1998 Montreux Festival. Howard Goodall's Big Bangs won in 2000 the prestigious BAFTA Huw Weldon award in the UK, a Peabody award (USA) for Journalism & Mass Communication, and an IMZ TV award for Best Documentary (Austria). Howard Goodall's Great Dates in 2002 was BAFTA-nominated. In December 2004 he presented a South Bank Show on schools' music in the UK, Musical Nation, and his 2004 series for Channel 4, Howard Goodall's 20th Century Greats, won an RTS Award for Education and was nominated for a BAFTA Award and an International Rose d'Or.

His new 4-part series, How Music Works, was aired on Channel 4 on November 11th 2006.

In July 2006 Howard was honoured with a Doctorate of Music from Bishop Grosseteste University College, Lincoln in recognition of his contribution to music education and in October is to be awarded a British Academy of Composers & Songwriters Gold Badge Award for exceptional work in support of his fellow British composers. He is a trustee of The Sage Gateshead, the Purcell School Foundation and the Voices Foundation. He is chair of the National Vocal Strategy on behalf of Youth Music and the Music Manifesto and is to be the recipient of the 2007 Making Music/Sir Charles Grove Prize for Outstanding Contribution to British Music.