Howard Blake

About the composer

Howard Blake (born in 1938),  is a pianist, conductor and composer. He grew up in Brighton (England), at 18 winning a scholarship to The Royal Academy of Music where he studied piano. In the early part of his career he wrote numerous film scores, including The Duellists with Ridley Scott and The Snowman, a 1982 TV short nominated for an Oscar. His famous song Walking in the Air was the chart success that launched Aled Jones in 1985, whilst the concert version for narrator and orchestra is performed world-wide and the full-length ballet for Sadler’s Wells runs for a season every year in London. Concert works include the Piano Concerto commissioned for Princess Diana, the Violin Concerto commissioned for the City of Leeds, the Clarinet Concerto commissioned by Thea King and the English Chamber Orchestra and large-scale choral/orchestral works such as Benedictus and The Passion of Mary both recorded with the RPO. He is increasingly adding to his catalogue of CDs which includes Sir Neville Marriner conducting the woodwind concertos with The Academy of St. Martin in the Fields and Walking in the Air – the piano music of Howard Blake – recorded by Vladimir Ashkenazy. He was made a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music in 1988 and received the OBE for services to music from the Queen in 1994. (based on Short biography on his official website).