Murray Gold

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Murray Gold (born 28 February 1969[1]) was the composer for the revived series of Doctor Who from 2005 to 2017. He also composed for Torchwood in its first and fourth series.

During his time working for BBC Wales Doctor Who, Gold arranged many versions of the "Doctor Who theme", as heard on Doctor Who, Doctor Who Confidential, Doctor Who Extra and Totally Doctor Who. He also composed the theme music for Torchwood, Torchwood Declassified, The Sarah Jane Adventures and Sarah Jane's Alien Files.

After twelve years scoring for Doctor Who, under both Russell T Davies and Steven Moffat, the start of Chris Chibnall's era in 2018 marked the departure of Murray Gold as composer, and the arrival of Segun Akinola.

Doctor Who

Gold was assigned as Doctor Who's composer in 2004 after an email from Russell T Davies who asked him to work on the show. Gold immediately took up the offer. The music from Series 1 was composed and created by himself using sampled instruments at his digital music studio in his flat in Frognal (Hampstead), London. All of the music was created digitally, except for Gold's use of the Crouch End Festival Chorus for heavy choral parts, most notably the Dalek motifs. He went on to form a good relationship with the choir, as demonstrated in his further use of them in the following seasons.

Shortly after the airing of Series 1, Gold and the producers proposed that the music should be written and adapted to be performed orchestrally. The show’s growing popularity and increased budget catered for this and so Gold began his involvement with Ben Foster and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales. The 2005 Christmas Special was the first episode to feature orchestral music, however Gold continued creating many minor pieces completely digitally using sampled instruments until around Series 3.

In 2007 Gold moved to, and mainly based himself in New York and Los Angeles, though he often travels between the US and the UK. As shown in a 2008 Confidential episode, recording sessions of music were viewed by him through a digital video link in order for him to communicate with the orchestra, conductor and music team.

Gold's most prominent work for the DWU has likely been new arrangements of the "Doctor Who theme". He has arranged multiple different versions of the theme for broadcast (including three distinct opening theme arrangements, plus another version that was only used in trailers and promotions in 2005) and several more for live performance. Gold has therefore created more official arrangements of the theme than any other Doctor Who franchise composer.

Gold has also written seven non-score based lyrical songs for the series: "Song for Ten" (The Christmas Invasion), "Love Don't Roam" (The Runaway Bride), "My Angel Put the Devil in Me" (Daleks in Manhattan), "The Stowaway" (Voyage of the Damned), "Song of Freedom" (Planet of the Ood and Journey's End),"Vale Decem" (The End of Time) and "Abigail's Song (Silence Is All You Know)" (A Christmas Carol). Murray Gold also appeared, in a cameo role, as a guitarist in Voyage of the Damned. (DWMSE 20)

He was interviewed about his DW music by "Sound On Sound" magazine in the June 2007 issue. (See [1])

Gold stayed on as house composer for the 2010 season of Doctor Who and created a third major rearrangement of the theme tune, bringing in a short new melody at the beginning of the theme.

He also contributed to the charity reference book Behind the Sofa: Celebrity Memories of Doctor Who.

In early 2018, Murray Gold announced his departure from Doctor Who at the Gallifrey One convention, confirming that the 2017 Christmas special, Twice Upon A Time, was his last episode. During his panel talk at the convention, Gold gave a presentation about his time on the show.[2]

Segun Akinola took over as composer, beginning with series 11 that year: the start of the Chibnall era.

Soundtrack releases

Several soundtracks for Gold's Doctor Who work have been released. He has been active in the production of each release.

Additionally, two soundtracks for spin-off series Torchwood have been released since 2008, with Murray Gold working alongside fellow Torchwood composer, Ben Foster, on the initial release.

As of 2023, the soundtrack for Series 10, Gold's last series, of Doctor Who has not been released, despite the release of further series' soundtracks and the fans demanding the final soundtrack of Gold's era. It is unknown if the lack of release is down to the BBC, Silva Screen or Gold himself. However, Gold has hinted that he is working on potentially having the soundtrack produced.

Spin-offs

Gold has written the theme for both Torchwood and The Sarah Jane Adventures, as well as Torchwood Declassified and Sarah Jane's Alien Files which featured re-arrangements of the themes of their parent series. Although two Torchwood CDs have been released, none have been released for SJA as of 2011.

He has not been heavily involved in the incidental music scores for the spin-offs. With the exception of a few early episodes in the first series of Torchwood, he has mostly only scored the parent programme. However, he was the main composer for Torchwood: Miracle Day.

Relationship with RTD

Gold has enjoyed a long working relationship with Russell T Davies and has in scored virtually all of RTD's productions since 1999, including Queer as Folk, The Second Coming with Christopher Eccleston and Lesley Sharp, and Casanova with David Tennant, Shaun Parkes and Nina Sosanya.

Other work

Despite a close relationship with RTD, Gold is far from "RTD's composer". He has gained notoriety on a variety of non-RTD projects. For instance, he started work on the TV series Shameless at about the same time as Doctor Who, and has been scoring both series for the same amount of time. In the early 2000s, his theme music for Clocking Off — a show that featured the talents of actors Christopher Eccleston, Lesley Sharp and Sarah Lancashire, and director Geoffrey Sax — was RTS-nominated. More recently, he was the composer on David Tennant's Single Father mini-series and of the Suranne Jones/Lesley Sharp police procedural, Scott & Bailey.

Awards

Though nominated four times for different projects, including Doctor Who, Gold has never won a BAFTA award. He has, however, won a Royal Television Society Award for his work on Queer as Folk.

Credits

Music

Title music

External links

Footnotes

  1. ↑ Doctor Who Guide
  2. ↑ https://www.express.co.uk/showbiz/tv-radio/921558/Doctor-Who-BBC-Series-11-Jodie-Whittaker-Bradley-Walsh-Exit-Composer-Writer-Murray-Gold-Dr
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