Laura’s major achievements include winning a competition to write an orchestral score for a film which was performed by the London Musici Orchestra at the Queen Elizabeth Hall. She has written scores for many films including It’s OK to Drink Whiskey – a film directed by Paul Williams for Fox Searchlight, and Porlock Calling Rockall, a film for HTV. She has also written music for television documentaries, including Marking Time (a six-part history series for ITV), a four-part series for HTV The Cotswold Canals presented by Lloyd Grossman, and The Real Sir Francis Drake for Carlton TV, as well as many others. She also had her music for an animation performed live with film by the BBC Concert Orchestra.
Laura has been writing music for the British Film Institute since 1998 for re-releases of early silent movies. These include the best-selling Silent Shakespeare (seven short films), performed at the Barbican with the 4th Dimension String Quartet. Other BFI films Laura has scored are Twilight of a Woman's Soul on the DVD Mad Love (a collection of films by Evgenii Bauer), C.O.D. by Desmond Dickenson and Tusalava by Len Lye on the video British Avant Garde vol. 1. Laura was also commissioned by the Imperial War Museum to write an orchestral score for The Battle of the Ancre, an important historical film from the First World War which was performed live with film at the museum. They have recently asked her to score The Battle of the Somme for DVD release with a live orchestral premier of the film.
Last summer Laura was chosen to go to Lithuania on a European film making course where she was awarded ‘Best Film Composer’. She was a guest speaker at the 2003 International Conference of Philosophy and Literature talking about her scores for Silent Shakespeare, and was chosen to be a judge for best soundtrack at the International Festival of Cinema and Technology. Laura has just completed a tour across the UK of the seven Silent Shakespeare films with live accompaniment, as well as doing educational workshops on writing music for film at schools and colleges. She has recently been asked to perform her music live with film at the 2005 Belfast Film Festival.
Laura has been commissioned to write numerous chamber and orchestral works including Under the Rainbow – a seven movement orchestral/choral multicultural piece – and Dream with the Fishes, both for the Ealing Symphony Orchestra. Other commissions include Golden Jubilee (a special commission for the Queen’s Jubilee) and The River, which was performed at the Queen Elizabeth Hall by the Solaris String Quartet. She has also written jazz orchestra works performed at the London Jazz Festival as well as music for dance and music theatre. She has recently written many pieces for the London College of Music Percussion and Jazz Piano syllabus. In addition, Laura has worked for ‘The Music Gallery’, composing music for adverts, and was chosen for the SPNM project ‘Composing for Film’ with composer Debbie Wiseman and director Brian Gilbert that culminated in a presentation of her film music at the Royal Festival Hall.
For more information please go to http://www.laurarossi.com
April 2005