BMI will continue to celebrate and nurture the art of conducting at the organization's annual six-day Conducting for the Film Composer workshop series, taught by BMI Classic Contribution Award winner, conductor and composer Lucas Richman. Each year, an elite group of BMI composers are selected to participate in the workshop, where they will hone the craft of conducting, from the fundamentals of multi-meter scores, to conducting to picture with a 32-piece orchestra. Classes will be taught at BMI's office, the Professional Musicians Union Local 47, and Sonic Fuel Studios, all in the Los Angeles area.
In 2007, BMI honored Lucas Richman with the Classic Contribution Award, recognizing his service in leading BMI's celebrated conductors' workshop. A BMI composer and conductor, Richman has led the workshop, now entering its 15th year, since its inception. He has served as Music Director for the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra since 2003 and as Music Director and Conductor for the Bangor Symphony Orchestra since 2010. A Grammy-winning conductor, Richman is a leading expert in conducting and composing, having fashioned an outstanding career as a conductor with numerous symphonies and orchestras in the U.S. He has also proved himself an invaluable collaborator for numerous film composers, serving as conductor for movies including the Academy Award-nominated As Good As It Gets, Face/Off, Seven, Breakdown, Anastasia and The Village. Richman was also asked by John Williams to conduct the North American tour of the latter's summer Star Wars in Concert.
This year's exemplary group of students will include working film and television composers Dan Beyer (contributed music to The Amazing Race, The Bachelor and Ghost Whisperer); John Graham (Alleged, Bitch Slap and American Strays); Kevin Kiner (CSI: Miami and Clone Wars); Tony Morales (Hatfields & McCoys and Gopher Broke); Kerry Muzzey (A Holiday Engagement and BearCity); Kurt Oldman (Tapia, Holiday Baggage and King of Paper Chasin'); Mac Quayle (contributed music to The Lincoln Lawyer, Contagion and Savages) and Greg Tripi (Trial by Fire, contributed music to Drive and Ghost Rider). The class is coordinated by Ray Yee, BMI Executive Director, Film/TV Relations, along with BMI's Film/TV Relations staff.
Past participants in the celebrated workshop include composers Cliff Martinez, Stewart Copeland, Danny Pelfrey, Richard Gibbs, Bill Brown, Bennett Salvay, Rolfe Kent, David Schwartz, Anthony Marinelli, Alex Wurman, David Buckley, Tyler Bates, Nate Barr, James Venable, Mervyn Warren, Chris Lennertz, Laura Karpman, Juan Carlos Rodriguez, Rick Marvin, Adam Berry and David Kitay.
About BMI Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI), a global leader in music rights management, is an American performing rights organization that represents more than 500,000 songwriters, composers and music publishers in all genres of music and more than 7.5 million musical works. BMI has represented the most popular and beloved music from around the world for more than 70 years. The company provides licenses for businesses that perform music, and distributes the fees it generates as royalties to the musical creators and copyright owners it represents.