BIO & CONTACT | Horace Dann-Atkin

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Horace Dann-Atkin is a composer for stories. He uses his music to manifest the colours and emotions of a storyteller’s world to linger on in the minds of their audience long after they’ve walked away from the experience.

Coming from a non-musical family, Horace was a late-bloomer in music, performing in bands as a guitarist and singer (though the latter is less polished nowadays). It wasn't until his late teens when he discovered the world of scoring, falling in love with Jon Brion's work on 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind' (2004). Soon after Horace re-discovered all the music that had surrounded him in his childhood and given life to many of his favourite games such as 'Shadow of the Colossus' (2006) composed by Kow Otani.

Whilst studying (and since) Music Composition and Technology at The University for the Creative Arts (UK), Horace has had privilege to work with his fellow storytellers. Bringing to life the worlds of film-makers, animators and game developers, he offers his musical language as a contemporary composer and orchestrator to build a richer sonic-world of emotional language, enveloping us in the conflicts and comforts of the unfolding story. More than often, Horace has found great comfort and inspiration in joining in a project's early development and working closer within the team as opposed to an external member, frequently scoring the initial tone and character of music at the level of the script.

Storytelling is a human proclivity; and music has long had its roots in conjuring its seemingly magical hold on us all.

Horace is a composer for an ever-expanding palette of instruments reaching beyond the western world and conventional styles of classical instrumentation.

As a contemporary composer Horace's rich emotional language within music is considered at the very atom of the composition, focusing first on the design of the voice of the instrument; is the voice aggressive and bitter, reserved and unsure, perhaps in love?

With a deep affection and fascination for the emotional power conjured by the ferocity of a large orchestral composition, Horace has also found that it holds the same potential to offer a humble and heartfelt intimacy often reserved for smaller ensembles and solo performances.

As well as composing for both linear (film-scoring) and non-linear (interactive game scoring) mediums, Horace has on numerous projects worked also as a studio and mixing engineer, foley artist, sound designer and sound editor in tangent with his responsibilities as a composer and orchestrator. This experience has allowed Horace to appreciate the ability of audio sonic facet to shape and react to one-another, encouraging him to be involved in the entire life-cycle of a developing sonic world whilst on a project.