Gerhard Daum

The award winning film music composer Gerhard Daum writes music for US and European films and TV, successfully blending the musical spirit of the two continents to create a fresh and unique voice.

Early in his life Gerhard learned to play the trumpet, performing in marching bands. In his teens he focused on the guitar and piano, subsequently studying classical music and Jazz at the universities of Karlsruhe, Germany and Graz, Austria, and later on teaching guitar and improvisation at the popular Jazz & Rock Schule Freiburg. Performing with internationally acclaimed musicians and touring with his own Jazz/Rock Quartet throughout Europe initialized his passion for composing and blending multicultural influences in his works.

Accepting an offer to work at the film music department of the Bavarian Broadcasting Station brought him to Munich. This was a great chance to work and communicate with directors and producers in finding the appropriate music for their films. The BR Radio/Film archive is an invaluable source of inspiration regarding film music. Gerhard spent a great amount of time analyzing and listening to scores from Rota, Waxman, Herrmann, Barry, Morricone and Williams among others. Multiple scores for TV films (Tatort), event movies and TV-series (Forsthaus Falkenau) followed due to his multifaceted background, additionally attracting offers to compose commercial and trailer music for well-known companies.

In order to further expand his knowledge and experience, Gerhard moved to Hollywood in the late nineties, taking classes in Music Ethnology at CSUN and the film music master class at UCLA. Working in Los Angeles over a decade, he composed scores for numerous independent movies as well as studio productions like Sony’s “Felon”, starring Val Kilmer and Stephen Dorff. Films with his score won the New York Film Fest Silver Medal and the Los Angeles Indie Fest Film Award; for his score “Every Child Counts” he was rewarded with the NTVA Music Composition Gold Award.

Today, Gerhard lives and works in Berlin. The vibrant and diverse city fuels him in the newest chapter of his exciting quest to achieve musical integrity.

Gerhard Daum believes that the excellence of a film music score is based on craftsmanship and musical vision. Craftsmanship ensures that the score supports the structure and the function of the film, the vision touches “the subconscious”, enhancing the psychological and emotional spirit of the characters in the movie.

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