Biography

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Benjamin's work has earned him multiple international awards and nominations, including an Ivor Novello Award Nomination for Best Original Film Score 2009, a nomination in the 2009 Emmy® Awards and two nominations as 'Discovery of The Year' in the 2005 and 2008 World Soundtrack Awards.

Since 1996 Benjamin has received over 50 commissions for the concert hall, cinema, ballet and theatre. He made his BBC Proms debut in 2006 conducting the world première of Escape Velocity; the fourth work composed under his ongoing tenure as Associate Composer of the Orchestra of St. John’s.  His debut CD was released by Quartz in November 2006 to critical acclaim and he signed an exclusive publishing agreement with Edition Peters in August 2006. His most recent film score, for Rupert Wyatt's The Escapist was nominated as Best Original Film Score in the 2009 Ivor Novello Awards.

Benjamin has written for the BBC, Bath International Festival of Music (for three consecutive seasons), Belcea Quartet, Orchestre de Bretagne, Central St. Martin’s College of Art and Design, Chelmsford Festival, Coull Quartet, English Chamber Orchestra, Goldberg Ensemble, Hallé Orchestra, Hamburg Symphony Orchestra, Lake District Summer Music, Leamington Festival, Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, Manchester Camerata, Park Lane Group, Royal College of Art and the Warwick Arts Society. His music has been performed at venues including the Barbican, Berlin Philharmonie, Bridgewater Hall, Cadogan Hall, Muziekcentrum Vredenburg Utrecht, Purcell Room, Royal Opera House Linbury Theatre, The Lowry Theatre, St. John’s Smith Square and Wigmore Hall. In 2003 he was commissioned by the Rambert Dance Company to compose an electroacoustic ballet score for award-winning choreographer Rafael Bonachela. Rambert gave the London Première of the new work at Saddler's Wells to critical acclaim and it was later featured in their UK tour 2003/04. Ben has worked closely with the BBC Singers and six of his works have been broadcast on BBC Radio 3.

Born in London in 1979 Benjamin was awarded the Master of Music degree with Distinction in composition from the Royal Academy of Music and is the first composer in the Academy’s history to be awarded an Honorary DipRAM. Whilst at the Academy, Benjamin was the recipient of every composition prize including the Theodore Holland Intercollegiate Prize and the Performing Right Society Foundation Scholarship. He graduated from the Joint Course of the Royal Northern College of Music and the University of Manchester with First Class Honours and his composition teachers have included Anthony Gilbert, Michael Finnissy, James MacMillan and Robert Saxton.