Born in Wales, Ceiri Torjussen gained his bachelor’s in composition at the University of York, UK, and his master’s at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles. Perhaps being educated on two continents and fluent in both English and Welsh plays some role in the ease with which Ceiri navigates between the worlds of film and concert music.
Ceiri has scored several feature films, and has orchestrated and conducted many more. (See a partial list at www.ceiri.com.) He has provided additional music for such films as Live Free or Die Hard, Scary Movie 2 and The Eye in addition to network TV shows such as Close to Home and Cold Case. He’s also composed music for several animated programs including Dive Olly Dive, for which he received a Daytime Emmy nomination for Best Original Score.
His orchestral work, Momentum, has been performed widely, notably by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, and conducted by such figures as Esa-Pekka Salonen and Grant Llewellyn, and he has received numerous concert commissions from a variety of ensembles.
Ceiri was kind enough to share a little of his work with Finale for our blog:
“I’ve been using Finale since my undergrad years and have seen it continuously evolve and improve. Since I work in both film and concert music I’ve found it a vital tool in both disciplines. I’ve used it for everything from large-scale symphonic works to my most recent piece – a solo harp commission for Catrin Finch. Finale’s versatile cross-staff beaming capabilities made producing my final copy much easier than I expected it to be. Harp music is notoriously difficult to notate, but Finale was able to cope with even the most complex passages.
For my film work I’ve used Finale for everything from sketching cues to producing the final full orchestral scores which are used in the studio sessions. My most recent music for Repo Men was orchestrated entirely in Finale and with the use of metatools and QuicKeys, the process was fast and efficient. I’m certain I’ll be using this software for years to come!”
I’d like to thank Ceiri for taking the time to share a little glimpse of his life with Finale.
What worlds are you navigating with Finale? Let us know by clicking on “Comments” below!