David C. Hëwitt

Film score composer David C. Hëwitt was born in Whitechapel, East London in 1968 and at six years old he began studying the piano privately under Ms. L. Bloom. In the 1970s, inspired by Isao Tomita he developed a way of multi tracking a monophonic synthesizer using two primitive cassette recorders. His first recording was a multi-tracked version of Jupiter from Holst’s Planet suite.

In the early 80s David joined a jazz trio, he was now playing the Fender Rhodes Mk II stage piano alongside the brother of respected jazz drummer Dave Trigwell. These years opened up a whole new musical palette for him far away from the classical standards he had become used to.

Career beginnings

In the late 80s David joined Mandragora as their keyboard player during which time the band lived and toured together extensively. Mandragora finally released their debut LP on vinyl in 1988, David [...] his studio teeth during these 24 track sessions as the entire recording was made on two-inch analog tape traveling at 75ips.

After completing his recording and contractual obligations David parted ways with Mandragora. The road took him to Italy and he spent the next year in Rome where he put together a three-piece jazz-rock outfit. During this time he wrote and recorded ideas for his next project and after returning from Rome David had enough material for an album. Simply entitled ‘David C. Hëwitt & The Gypsies’ the work was recorded in Edinburgh Scotland for Polydor records – although finished in 1991 the album remains unreleased to this day.

In 1994 David formed a new Band called Full of Hate (F.O.H), finally 1998 saw David record another album entitled ‘Created to Suffer’, it was at this point that David’s music took a much darker direction, he toured the complete album with F.O.H during the nineties.

Gorerotted

In 1999 David was asked to join the now critically acclaimed UK death metal act ‘Gorerotted’ who were launched by The Sun newspaper in 1997. David’s years of musical experience shaped the Gorerotted sound and they were quickly signed to Metal Blade records releasing their first album ‘Mutilated in Minutes’ in 2000. David also contributed heavily to Gorerotted’s second album entitled ‘Only Tools and Corpses’ finally leaving in 2001 to open ‘Powermaster’ a mastering studio in north London. Incidentally, all members of Gorerotted had stage names that were integral to the bizarre stage show – David’s was simply ‘Dicksplash’.

David now took to studying the piano again, this time under the strict but kind hand of Muriel Hay (LRAM). It was during the early 2000s that David was approached and asked to score many short films, finally a career choice was made - to become a film score composer. To ensure success in this field David decided to study a BA in music and theology, one of the oldest and most traditional courses for aspiring composers. Before long he had won a place at Greensboro College in North Carolina in the US where he studied the piano, choral conducting and composition. His affiliation also gave him access to the renowned University of North Carolina Greensboro (UNCG) to further augment his studies. David returned from America in 2005 with world class BA in music and theology.

Recent work

2008 saw David score the music for the pilot episode of a new TV show entitled ‘One Night at The Curtain', in 2009 he scored another pilot TV show called ‘Readings from the Ah-Beer’ a rude, funny, totally CGI cartoon akin to Beavis and Butthead. Finally 2009 saw David score his first feature film a dark modern remake of Shakespeare’s Macbeth starring Anthony Head from Buffy the Vampire Slayer and two other rising stars Fergus March and Amelia Powers. The gritty urban realization of the Macbeth story required a gritty modern score - a concerto for orchestra and sledgehammer.

Recently, on the strength of David’s mastery of the Sibelius software the world-renowned Vienna Symphonic Library commissioned him to write three articles for them on his technique. These three articles have now been completed and they are due for publication in 2010.

Discography

• Over The Moon (Mandragora 1987) • The Gypsies (Polydor 1991) • Created To Suffer (F.O.H 1997) • Mutilated in Minutes (Gorerotted/Metal Blade 2000) • Only Tools and Corpses (Gorerotted/Metal Blade 2002) • Genetic (White Disk 2003/4) • Classical Piano Expressions (Absolute/Rosenklang 2008) • Genetic – Re-release (Rosenklang 2009) • World in Essence (Rosenklang 2009) • Crunk, Dancehall and Hip Hop Killaz (Rosenklang 2009)

Filmography

• Smell of The World. (Additional Music) Directed by Simon Belton 1998). • Romanian Crises Docu. (Score) Directed by Tom Sykes for BBC South 2000). • Solid State (Additional music) directed By Marek Steven 2003). • Hard Attack (Score) Dir. by American Director Derek Sieg 2003) • Winner Takes All (Additional music) Dir Helen Jack Little Dragon Films 2004) • Birthday Boy (Score) Directed by Simon Brown (Ex BBC) 2004). • A Carousel Film (Score) Directed by Robert Hindle 2005/6). • Ducks (Additional music + DVD Theme) Dir. by BBC’s Adam Young 2007) • Russian Front (Score). Promo Dir. by DCH 2007). • Safe House (Score) Directed by Nicholas Paton 2008). • Operation Malcom's Garden (Score) (Dir. By Michael Burges 2008). • One Night at the Curtain (Score) Directed by Nicholas Paton 2008). • Macbeth (Score) Directed by Nicholas Paton 2009). • Readings from the Ah-Beer (Score) Dir. Bob Morris 2009). • Fashionaires (Score) Dir. SRS 2010).