John Ashton Thomas

John has been involved with the world of music since 1969 when he became a chorister at Exeter Cathedral. There he gained early encouragement from Organist Lionel Dakers, who conducted the performance of his first choral work (which had a duration 10 seconds), and assistant Organist Paul Morgan, who gave John the job of Organist on one occasion, and performed an early composition of John's in 1974.

John studied Composition and Piano at Trinity College of Music from 1980-84 where his composition teacher was Richard Arnell. In 1984 John was awarded the senior composition prize at Trinity. During this period he wrote several film scores for students at the London International Film School, and played in several bands including The Pyramid Posse, who were a reggae band that performed at many open-air festivals organised by the Ken Livingstone-era GLC. On leaving Trinity John became a music Lecturer in Liverpool for two years, and also became one of the city's busiest jazz pianists, working with several U.S. jazz artists such as Bill Perkins and Phil Wilson.

John returned to London in 1986 where he rejoined The Chance Element, an experimental minimalist funk band who played in venues across London and south-east England, and played the Glastonbury Festival in 1992. He also resumed his relationship with the London International Film School, writing several more film scores. One, entitled The Contract (directed by Tony Meyer) was shown extensively in theatres across the UK and on national television, giving John the opportunity he needed to join the PRS.

During this period John taught in several schools and colleges in London, as well as working as a keyboard player and writing music for film and advertising use. He also studied for, and was awarded a M.Mus. degree in composition from the University of London where his teacher was Stanley Glasser at Goldsmiths' College.

In the early 90s John started a long and fruitful relationship with Candle Music in London where he worked for over ten years writing music for TV, cinema and radio commercials. During this period he also started to write for the then Zomba, now Universal music library. Also in the early 90s John joined the staff at both Trinity College of Music, where he teaches Composition, and the Royal Academy of Music, where he taught in the Jazz Department. At the Royal Academy John led a series of ambitious projects that involved the students (and him, sometimes) transcribing and performing an album's worth of material. These included Jaco Pastorius's Word of Mouth album, as well as projects featuring the music of Gil Evans, Oliver Nelson, Quincy Jones, Don Ellis and Earth, Wind and Fire.

Some highlights of John's career as a composer of concert music have been "Meeting Points", a ballet, performed at The Place, London in 1984, "Let's Get Moving! ", for chamber ensemble and Tape was selected by the SPNM for performance at the ICA in 1994, and "Two Blake Songs" for mixed choir was performed at St. Michael's, Bloomsbury in 1994. "Music of the early 21st century" for Alto Saxophone and electronics was recorded and performed by Martin Speake and John in 2000, and was released by Sonic Arts Network on the CD "Sonic Postcards". "Music for 3 Quintets, 3 Sextets and 7 Percussion" was performed twice in 2005 at Blackheath Concert Halls by Trinity College of Music.

In 2001 John started working with film composer and fellow former Trinity College student John Powell. The first film on which John worked with John Powell was "Rat Race". Others have been "Happy Feet", "Horton Hears a
who" and two of the Bourne series. Since moving to Los Angeles in 2006 John has Orchestrated, in addition to many John Powell projects, several scores by other film composers including Alan Silvestri, John Debney and Christophe Beck.

John is also a composer of dozens of pieces of library music, and is currently writing a series of Orchestral pieces for the Universal music library. He is also working on a series of choral and instrumental pieces. John is married with two children and lives in Marina Del Rey, California.

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