Composer, writer and music producer Mike Sheppard.
His published works for performance include music for choirs, orchestras and jazz ensembles. His 2011 album The Soul Rests Eternal , featuring cellist Caroline Dale with the English Chamber Orchestra, was Radio 3’s ‘Presenter’s Choice’ and Classic FM’s ‘Sunday Best’.
Mike is an increasingly rare kind of musician — one who is equally at home in classical, jazz, pop or choral music. A multi-instrumentalist who is equally comfortable conducting an orchestra or programming a computer, he is adept at creating recordings using a hybrid of the best samples allied to multi-tracked live musicians.
He has played in, composed for, conducted and produced the National Youth Jazz Orchestra over many years. He has created music for film, TV and advertising in a wide range of styles and genres from orchestral film score to string quartet; from choral orchestral to jazz and big band. His media music can be heard in a wide variety of commercial settings – from children’s TV (Brum for BBC) to TV Drama (Marple / Poirot for LWT / Granada); from advertising (Sony PlayStation 3) to film (Bill of Mortality / Saving Lives).
Since 2010 he has pursued his passion for choral writing in recordings with the internationally acclaimed choirs Tenebrae, Voces8, Commotio and the choir of Royal Holloway, among others.
In 2011 the BBC Concert Orchestra made his works the centrepiece of a live broadcast concert that featured a 20 minute interview with the composer in the interval. That interview can be heard on the Concert Music page on this website.
In 2012 he formed a co-writing partnership for musical theatre with Phil Edwards, since when they have written five new shows for film and theatre.
In 2013 he entered into an agreement with the prestigious publishing house Edition Peters, who publish his choral music globally.
He is a full member of PRS / MCPS and a professional member of the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors (BASCA).
He is also a published author on music education. In 2017 the Hal Leonard Corporation will publish six of his books on music education.
He is very active in his work of bringing music to others, whether as a composer-in-residence or as a conductor & teacher. He works regularly with young musicians and teaches composition.
As a composer/producer Mike has created music for scores of films, TV ads and TV programmes. His ‘serious’ concert works are published by Edition Peters and have been performed and recorded by the BBC Concert Orchestra, the English Chamber Orchestra, Aurora Orchestra, and the choirs Tenebrae and Commotio.
Mike is unique as a creative musician who also has more than 30 years’ senior level business experience in the music industry. As a publisher he was part of a management team that put together a major UK/USA JV company; he has worked with all major publishers, record labels and other rights holders such as the BBC and SKY.
As a Managing Editor of a major international publishing group he controlled an annual production budget in excess of £2m.
‘The Soul Rests Eternal’, an album of music composed by Mike for cello and orchestra, recorded by Caroline Dale and the English Chamber Orchestra, was ‘Sunday Best’ on Classic FM and ‘Presenter’s Choice’ on BBC R3 in the same week.
His orchestrations for the Decca CD ‘Introit — the music of Gerald Finzi’ met with great critical acclaim. The CD, featuring the Aurora Orchestra under principal conductor Nicholas Collon, went straight into the classical charts at no. 1.
In September 2016 Mike was nominated a ‘Great British Discovery’ by Classic FM.