Tandis Jenhudson (born 1979) is a British musician, composer and medical doctor, best known for his work on film and television soundtracks. He has received two Royal Television Society award nominations and is the first composer to have been honoured as a BAFTA ''Breakthrough Brit''.

Early life and education

Tandis was born in Clapham, London in 1979 and attended St George's Hanover Square Primary School, and the

London Nautical School The London Nautical School (LNS) is an 11–18 foundation secondary school for boys and mixed sixth form in Blackfriars, Greater London, England. It was established in 1915. History The London Nautical School was established in 1915 in respon ...

and Christ's College, Finchley secondary schools. Despite his early interest in music, he studied Medicine at UCL and divides his time between medicine and music. He composed soundtracks for numerous short films during his early medical career, one of which was nominated for a

BAFTA Cymru BAFTA Cymru (or BAFTA in Wales or WAFTA) is the Welsh branch of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) and was founded in 1987.

award in 2005. In a 2014 interview, with PRS for Music's ''M-Magazine'' he said "I was obsessed with TV themes when I was a kid in the eighties and would even dance to some of them when they came on: "

Ski Sunday ''Ski Sunday'' is the BBC Sports weekly magazine-style television show covering winter sports, broadcast in the United Kingdom on Sundays in a late afternoon or an early evening time-slot. It began in 1978, and is currently presented by Ed Leigh ...

Dallas Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...

, The A-Team,

Grange Hill ''Grange Hill'' is a British Children's television series, children's television drama series, originally produced by the BBC and portraying life in a typical Comprehensive school (England and Wales), comprehensive school. The show began its ru ...

, Airwolf,

Doctor Who ''Doctor Who'' is a British science fiction television series broadcast by the BBC since 1963. The series depicts the adventures of a Time Lord called the Doctor, an extraterrestrial being who appears to be human. The Doctor explores the u ...

, Knight Rider, and Doogie Howser, M.D." He studied piano achieving Grade 8 although describes himself as a largely self-taught composer, stating "most of my musical development has come from listening to and dissecting other people's music" citing Mozart's '' Eine kleine Nachtmusik'' and

Michael Jackson Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, and philanthropist. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he is regarded as one of the most significant cultural figures of the 20th century. Over a ...

as examples.

Film and television work

In 2013, he received his first television broadcast credit for ''The March'', a BBC/PBS documentary narrated by

Denzel Washington Denzel Hayes Washington Jr. (born December 28, 1954) is an American actor and filmmaker. He has been described as an actor who reconfigured "the concept of classic movie stardom". Throughout his career spanning over four decades, Washington ha ...

which received a BAFTA nomination at the

2014 British Academy Television Awards The 60th British Academy Television Awards nominations were announced on 7 April 2014. The awards ceremony sponsored by Arqiva was held on 18 May 2014 at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, London. Winners and nominations Winners are listed ...

. Directed by

John Akomfrah John Akomfrah (born 4 May 1957) is a British artist, writer, film director, screenwriter, theorist and curator of Ghanaian descent, whose "commitment to a radicalism both of politics and of cinematic form finds expression in all his films". A ...

and executive-produced by

Robert Redford Charles Robert Redford Jr. (born August 18, 1936) is an American actor and filmmaker. He is the List of awards and nominations received by Robert Redford, recipient of various accolades, including an Academy Awards, Academy Award from four nomi ...

''The March'' is about the historic 1963

March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, also known as simply the March on Washington or The Great March on Washington, was held in Washington, D.C., on August 28, 1963. The purpose of the march was to advocate for the civil and economic righ ...

– largely remembered for Martin Luther King's famous and iconic "

I Have a Dream "I Have a Dream" is a public speech that was delivered by American civil rights activist and Baptist minister, Martin Luther King Jr., during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963. In the speech, King called ...

" speech. In March 2015, Tandis was named laureate and winner in the media composer category at the first International MediaMusic competition in Moscow, for which film composer

Ennio Morricone Ennio Morricone (; 10 November 19286 July 2020) was an Italian composer, orchestrator, conductor, and trumpeter who wrote music in a wide range of styles. With more than 400 scores for cinema and television, as well as more than 100 classica ...

served as honorary chairman. In April he announced via Twitter that he was working on the soundtrack for ''

Vertigo Sea Vertigo is a condition where a person has the sensation of movement or of surrounding objects moving when they are not. Often it feels like a spinning or swaying movement. This may be associated with nausea, vomiting, sweating, or difficulties w ...

'', a three-screen video art installation by John Akomfrah, selected for the 2015 Venice Biennale. In May he was revealed as one of the judges for the 60th Anniversary Ivor Novello Awards, alongside Gary Barlow and

Guy Chambers Guy Antony Chambers (born 12 January 1963) is an English songwriter, musician and record producer, best known for his work with Robbie Williams. Education Chambers attended Quarry Bank Comprehensive School sixth form in Liverpool. From 18, h ...

. In the same year he scored the soundtrack to director

Christopher Riley Christopher Riley (born 1967) is a British writer, broadcaster and film maker specialising in the history of science. He has a PhD from Imperial College London, Imperial College, University of London where he pioneered the use of digital elevat ...

's National Geographic Channel film ''Hubble's Cosmic Journey''. In 2016, he composed the soundtrack for 'The Traffickers' an eight-part documentary TV series produced by

Simon Chinn Simon Chinn is a British film producer, founder of Red Box Films and co-founder of Lightbox. He produced a number of feature documentaries, including ''Man on Wire'' and ''Searching for Sugar Man'', both winners of the Academy Award for Best Docu ...

(winner of two Academy Awards for Searching for Sugar Man and Man On Wire) and Jonathan Chinn. In 2018, he scored Civilisations, a 9-part

art history Art history is the study of aesthetic objects and visual expression in historical and stylistic context. Traditionally, the discipline of art history emphasized painting, drawing, sculpture, architecture, ceramics and decorative arts; yet today ...

television series produced by the

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board ex ...

in association with

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...

as a follow-up to the original 1969 landmark series ''Civilisation'' by Kenneth Clark. It was presented and narrated by Simon Schama, Mary Beard and

David Olusoga David Adetayo Olusoga (born January 1970) is a British historian, writer, broadcaster, presenter and film-maker. He is Professor of Public History at the University of Manchester. He has presented historical documentaries on the BBC and contribu ...

. Jenhudson's soundtrack received two nominations at the RTS awards in 2018.

Video installation work

Tandis Jenhudson has created the soundtracks for two multi-screen video installations by the award-winning artist

. In 2015, he scored ''Vertigo Sea'', a 3-screen triptych that explores man's relationship with the sea and its role in the history of slavery, migration, and conflict. It premiered at the 2015

Venice Biennale The Venice Biennale (; it, La Biennale di Venezia) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy by the Biennale Foundation. The biennale has been organised every year since 1895, which makes it the oldest of ...

and has since exhibited at numerous galleries including Arnolfini, the

Turner Contemporary Turner Contemporary is one of the UK’s leading contemporary art galleries. Celebrating Margate’s connection with the painter J.M.W. Turner (1775 – 1851), an artist who believed that art could be an agent of change, its year-round exhibition ...

and as recently as 2018 at the

New Museum of Contemporary Art The New Museum of Contemporary Art, founded in 1977 by Marcia Tucker, is a museum in New York City at 235 Bowery, on Manhattan's Lower East Side. History The museum originally opened in a space in the Graduate Center of the then-named New Scho ...

in New York. It was nominated for a South Bank Sky Arts award in the Visual Arts category. In 2017, he collaborated with

David Julyan David Julyan is an English musician and score composer. He is best known for composing the scores for director Christopher Nolan's early films. Early life David Julyan was born in 1967 in Cheltenham, England. Other projects In 2006, he score ...

to score ''Purple'', a six-screen film about

climate change In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to E ...

, human communities and the wilderness. It exhibited for 14 weeks at the Barbican in London, receiving a 4-star review from

The Telegraph ''The Telegraph'', ''Daily Telegraph'', ''Sunday Telegraph'' and other variant names are popular names for newspapers. Newspapers with these titles include: Australia * ''The Telegraph'' (Adelaide), a newspaper in Adelaide, South Australia, publ ...

commenting that it offered "ravishing reminders of what we all stand to lose".

Awards and honours

In 2014, he was selected as a BAFTA ''Breakthrough Brit'' and as a result was mentored by his lifelong idol

. In 2018, he was nominated for two

Royal Television Society The Royal Television Society (RTS) is a British-based educational charity for the discussion, and analysis of television in all its forms, past, present, and future. It is the oldest television society in the world. It currently has fourteen r ...

awards for

Civilisations A civilization (or civilisation) is any complex society characterized by the development of State (polity), a state, social stratification, urban area, urbanization, and Symbol, symbolic systems of communication beyond natural language, natur ...

in the categories of ''Original Score'' and ''Original Title Music''.

Selected works

References

External links

Official website
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Jenhudson, Tandis English film score composers English male film score composers Musicians from London 1979 births BAFTA winners (people) Living people