Christopher Elliott (composer and arranger)

Christopher Elliott (born August 5 1966) is a British composer, arranger, pianist and conductor.^[1][2][3] Elliott has worked with artists such as Adele, Amy Winehouse, Mark Ronson, Liam Gallagher, Miley Cyrus, Rag‘n'Bone Man, Rufus Wainwright, and Baz Luhrman on the Oscar-winning film, Moulin Rouge!

Upon graduating from London Film School, Elliott initially wrote jingles and other small commissions working his way up. In 1994, he signed to the music publishing company, Zomba Music Publishers in London. Working with Richard Kirstein^[4] at Zomba led Elliott to work as a composer for film and television.^[5]

In 1999, Elliott scored the Peabody and BAFTA award-winning documentary series The Second World War in Colour^[6] for Carlton/ITV. Elliott was the composer for all subsequent In-Colour documentary series. Elliott won a Royal Television Society award for Best Music for 2003's The British Empire in Colour. Elliott also scored the feature film Suzie Gold^[7] in 2004 and feature-length documentary Stealing Klimt in 2007.^[8]

Elliott worked as an arranger, additional-score composer and conductor on Baz Luhrmann's Oscar award-winning film Moulin Rouge! with Marius De Vries.^[9] Elliott is credited with co-arranging "Elephant Love Medley," "El Tango de Roxanne," "Like A Virgin" and "Nature Boy." Elliott is credited as arranger and conductor on the Moulin Rouge! Vol 2 soundtrack for "The Pitch (Spectacular, Spectacular)," "One Day I'll Fly Away," "Meet Me In The Red Room," "The Show Must Go On," "Nature Boy/Ascension," and "Sparkling Diamonds"^[10] as well as scoring "Your Song" (Instrumental) [From the Score Cut "After The Storm"]. ^[11][12]

Elliott arranged and played piano on the song, "I Wish You Love," with Chrissie Hynde.^[13] The song was featured throughout the movie, Eye Of The Beholder serving as a leitmotif for the central character Joanna Eris played by Ashley Judd. Elliott also arranged the closing title song "Immortal" for the 2010 French gangster-action film, 22 Bullets, directed by Richard Berry and produced by Luc Besson.

In 2018, Elliott composed an orchestral arrangement of the Queen classic, "I Want It All" for the Eurosport official anthem for the XXIII Olympic Winter Games in Pyeong Chang, South Korea. The arrangement was performed by the London Symphony Orchestra and was produced by Sebastien and Emmanuel Lipszyc for La Plage Records.^[14]

In 2024, Elliott was the music arranger on Rebel Wilson's directorial debut, The Deb.^[15]

Elliott has worked in various capacities as a stringer arranger, orchestral arranger, conductor or performer, working with artists like Kelly Clarkson, Liam Gallagher, One Direction, Sugababes, Rufus Wainwright,^[16] A.R. Rahman, Unkle, Tom Jones, David Gray, Tom Odell, Bebel Gilberto, and Kris Dane.^[17][18]

Elliott has worked closely with Mark Ronson on several projects. Elliott told UNCUT magazine in 2021, that when he was working on Amy Winehouse's Back To Black, Winehouse told her producer Mark Ronson that she didn't want any “fucking strings” on her album. Elliott is quoted in the article assuring Mark Ronson not to worry, “I'll keep the strings low and ‘tremy' (tremolando) like ‘spooky,' dark and low, not high and pop-like.” Elliott also suggested recording a swathe of percussion instruments at the end of that recording session including the trademark descending tubular bells part heard in the song "Back to Black."^[19]

Mark Ronson hired Elliott to work with him on Miley Cyrus's 2018 single Nothing Breaks Like A Heart, telling NME, “That's the first time that I went and worked again with Chris Elliott, the string arranger who did all the strings on ‘Back To Black, ‘cause it needed that yearning. I think it has a bit of the same drama, for sure.”^[20] In December 2018, Elliott conducted his arrangement of Miley Cyrus and Mark Ronson's "Nothing Breaks Like A Heart" on BBC Radio 1 Live Lounge at BBC Maida Vale Studios, London, as well as Cyrus's cover of Ariana Grande's "No Tears Left To Cry."^[21][22]

After working behind the scenes for much of his career, Elliott signed to Nettwerk Music Group in 2018 as a recording artist and began releasing his own music,^[23] beginning with EP Gabriel and Serge (2019), following by is 2021 debut album, After The Storm.^[24] In 2020, Elliott released the single “Emmanuel," a version of the Christmas carol “Emmanuel” featuring his daughter, Georgie Elliott.

During the 1990s, Elliott collaborated with songwriter and poet Anne Clark, writing and recording songs, as well as performing piano and keyboards on various tours including the 1994 acoustic tour, which included recording the live album, Psychometry, (recorded at the Passionskirche, Berlin).^[25]

In 1999, Elliott performed on keyboards with The Pretenders at the Royal Albert Hall charity concert, Here, There and Everywhere – A Concert for Linda (1999), dedicated to the memory of Linda McCartney.^[26] The concert featured George Michael, Tom Jones, Elvis Costello, Neil Finn, The Pretenders, Sinead O'Connor, Marianne Faithful and Paul McCartney with The Pretenders acting as the house backing-band.^[27] In 1999, Elliott toured with The Pretenders playing keyboards to promote on the 1999 album, ¡Viva El Amor!.

Elliott, Bruce Woolley, Matthew Seligman, and Andy Visser are founding members of The Radio Science Orchestra, a theremin led Space-Age Pop ensemble.^[28][29] Radio Science Orchestra have recorded for film, television and radio, releasing a debut EP, Memories of the Future in 1996, and performed at the Glastonbury Festival in 1997 featuring Lydia Kavina, granddaughter of the Russian inventor Leon Theremin.^[30] They recorded "Storm" for 1998's, The Avengers soundtrack, sung by Grace Jones, which was nominated for a Razzie Award for "Worst Original Song," one of nine Razzie nominations for the movie.^[31][32]

Elliott conducted the sixty-piece BBC Concert Orchestra, in collaboration with Mark Ronson for the opening night of the 2007 BBC Electric Proms season at The Roundhouse, London.^[33] The concert featured many of the artists featured on Ronson's hit album, Version including Daniel Merriweather, Adele, Terry Hall, Alex Greenwald, Sean Lennon and Ricky Wilson. Elliott scored all the orchestral arrangements for the one-off concert.

• Chris Elliott website