New York, NY (Top40 Charts / ASCAP) ASCAP, the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, the world leader in performing rights and advocacy for music creators, announces that versatile film composer John Powell will be honored with the prestigious ASCAP
Henry Mancini Award at the 33rd annual ASCAP Screen
Music Awards in Los Angeles on May 23. Powell has scored more than 60 motion pictures and is best known for his scores for the Matt Damon Bourne trilogy and his animated film music, including How to
Train Your Dragon (for which he was nominated for an Oscar), FOX's Oscar-nominated Ferdinand, as well as Antz, Shrek, three Ice Age sequels, Rio and the How To
Train Your Dragon sequel. Up next for Powell is Disney's highly anticipated Solo: A Star Wars Story, directed by Ron Howard, in theaters on May 25. The ASCAP
Henry Mancini Award is presented to composers for outstanding achievements and contributions to the world of film and television music.
ASCAP will also recognize multifaceted film composer Germaine Franco with the ASCAP Shirley Walker Award. Franco is the first Latina composer invited to join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, music branch. She co-wrote and produced five original songs for Disney/Pixar's Oscar winning Coco, directed by Lee Unkrich and co-directed by Adrian Molina, for which she received an
Annie Award. Her action-packed score for Kung Fu
Panda - The Emperor's Quest, an immersive attraction, launches this summer at Universal Studios Hollywood. She is the composer of the Starz network TV series Vida from Creator/Exec Producer
Tanya Saracho, debuting May 6. Another upcoming project, Tag, for New Line Cinema and Warner Bros. is directed by Jeff Tomsic and will be in theaters June 15. The Shirley Walker Award award honors those whose achievements have contributed to the diversity of film and television music. An ASCAP member, Shirley Walker was one of the first prominent female composers working in film and television and is remembered as a pioneer for women in the film industry.
"There's no doubt that without John Powell's spirited scores, some of our favorite feature films would not be capable of moving us the way they do," said ASCAP President Paul Williams. "His gift for melody and sensitivity to what a scene needs follows in the grand film music tradition of Henry Mancini, whether he's adding suspense to a Jason Bourne chase scene, or capturing the wonder of a dragon's first flying lesson. We look forward to any movie graced with John's magic touch."
Williams continued, "Germaine Franco's kaleidoscopic work is impossible to summarize, spanning numerous visual media, musical genres and cultures. Her work on Disney Pixar's Coco, which incorporated traditional Mexican musical elements and included composing, songwriting, producing, arranging and orchestrating, is only the most recent highlight of her achievements in the film world."
The invitation-only dinner and awards ceremony will honor the composers and songwriters of the top box office film music, top-rated series and the most performed television music of 2017. ASCAP will also reveal the winners of its annual Composers' Choice Awards at the ceremony, which are open to voting by all eligible ASCAP writer members. The Composers' Choice Awards include three categories: Film Score of the Year, TV Composer of the Year and Video Game Score of the Year.
John Powell
John Powell was catapulted into the realm of A-list composers by displaying an entirely original voice with his oft-referenced scores to the Matt Damon Bourne trilogy. He has become the go-to writer for family animated films, scoring such hits as Shrek, Chicken Run, Ice Age (2 & 3), Bolt, Rio, Happy Feet (1 & 2) and Kung Fu
Panda (1 & 2). His pulsating action music has provided the fuel for Hancock, Green Zone, Stop Loss, Mr. and Mrs. Smith and The Italian Job. His music has also sweetened the romance of Two Weeks Notice and P.S. I Love You, empowered X-Men: The Last Stand, lent tenderness to I Am Sam and gripping drama to United 93. His infectious score for How to
Train Your Dragon earned him his first Academy Award nomination.
Powell's most recent work includes Warner Bros.' Pan starring Hugh Jackman, Universal Pictures' action-thriller Jason Bourne starring Matt Damon and Fox's Oscar-nominated animated feature Ferdinand. A native of London, Powell was an accomplished violinist as a child, wrote music for commercials out of school, and assisted composer Patrick Doyle in the early 1990s. He moved to the U.S. in 1997, wrote the score for Face/Off, co-wrote the score for Antz, and quickly became one of the most desirable, versatile and exciting composers in town.
Germaine Franco
Franco is the first Latina composer invited to join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, music branch. She is a versatile composer who creates music and songs that reflect her extensive training as an orchestral musician, electronic music programmer, multi-instrumentalist and lover of world music. Her upcoming project, Tag, directed by Jeff Tomsic for New Line Cinema and Warner Bros., is a hybrid score of electronica and action music; and her organic score for
Tanya Saracho on Starz' Vida includes indigenous Mexican chant, electronica and Latin music. Recently, Franco collaborated with Coco filmmakers Lee Unkrich, Adrian Molina and Darla K. Anderson for four years as an additional composer, song producer, arranger and orchestrator and was co-writer of the songs "Un Poco Loco" and "Proud Corazón." Her hip-hop and electronica score to DOPE, directed by Rick Famuyiwa (2015, Open Road Films), premiered at Cannes and Sundance Film Festivals. Franco's work on immersive reality (4D) and theme park attractions includes DreamWorks Animation's Motiongate and Kung Fu
Panda - The Emperor's Quest at Universal Studios Hollywood, produced by DreamWorks Animation and Universal Creative. Franco is a Sundance
Music Sound Design Fellow, a Women in Film
Music Fellow, an Advisory Board Member of Women in Media and a Board Member of the Alliance for Women Film Composers. She worked alongside composer John Powell and
Hans Zimmer on over 30 feature films including How to
Train Your Dragon (1 & 2), Rio (1 & 2), The Lorax, Happy Feet (1 & 2), Kung Fu
Panda (1,2 & 3) and The Bourne Supremacy.
About ASCAP
The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) is a professional membership organization of songwriters, composers and music publishers of every kind of music. ASCAP's mission is to license and promote the music of its members and foreign affiliates, obtain fair compensation for the public performance of their works and to distribute the royalties that it collects based upon those performances. ASCAP members write the world's best-loved music and ASCAP has pioneered the efficient licensing of that music to hundreds of thousands of enterprises who use it to add value to their business - from bars, restaurants and retail, to radio, TV and cable, to Internet, mobile services and more. The ASCAP license offers an efficient solution for businesses to legally perform ASCAP music while respecting the right of songwriters and composers to be paid fairly. With more than 650,000 members representing more than 11.5 million copyrighted works, ASCAP is the worldwide leader in performance royalties, service and advocacy for songwriters and composers, and the only American performing rights organization (PRO) owned and governed by its writer and publisher members. Learn more and stay in touch at www.ascap.com, on Twitter and Instagram @ASCAP and on Facebook.
