Christopher Austin

English conductor Christopher Austin is a passionately committed conductor of new music and has given more than 70 premieres in the last decade, more than 40 of those with the Brunel Ensemble of which he is Artistic Director. Equally at home in the Classical and Romantic repertoire, Austin devised the Brunel Ensemble’s SWEB Festival of Elgar, a critical and popular success that was also Highly Commended in the Royal Philharmonic Society Awards in 1999. As an orchestrator and conductor of film and television music, recent projects include Dan Jones’ scores for The Life of Mammals (BBC One) and the feature films Shadow of the Vampire, Tomorrow La Scala and Max (Ivor Novello Award 2004); Jeremy Sams’ score for Enduring Love; and Joby Talbot’s music for The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Christopher Austin studied composition at the University of Bristol with Raymond Warren and Adrian Beaumont, and at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where he was taught by Robert Saxton and Simon Bainbridge. He teaches orchestration and conducting at the Royal Academy of Music.