Benjamin Wallfisch works primarily as a composer, keyboardist, conductor, and orchestrator in the realms of film and television scoring. Rather than cultivating one recognizable voice, he has cultivated a broad range of approaches that encompass suspenseful tension, lighthearted jazz inflections, and sweeping dramatic textures. His first feature assignment arrived with the 2005 crime drama Dear Wendy, after which he contributed to an unusually wide array of projects that included the Turkish action epic Conquest 1453 (2012), the award-winning Kennedy-era drama Hidden Figures (2016), and the sci-fi noir Blade Runner 2049 (2017). Both of the later titles earned him Grammy nominations, each completed in collaboration with Hans Zimmer.
He entered the world in London, England in 1979, the son of violinist Elizabeth Wallfisch and cellist Raphael Wallfisch. Piano lessons began at age five and composition followed a year later. Formal training took him through the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, the University of Manchester, and postgraduate study at the Royal Academy of Music. Early professional engagements included projects for the BBC, a commissioned ballet, the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, and the English Chamber Orchestra.
Wallfisch stepped into the role of primary composer for a theatrical feature with Lars von Trier’s Dear Wendy in 2005. In the years leading to his next screen credit, the 2008 drama The Escapist, he served as orchestrator and conductor on titles such as Pride & Prejudice, V for Vendetta, and Atonement. After completing several short films, documentaries, and television movies, he scored the 2012 release Conquest 1453, followed by the Steven Spielberg-produced documentary short Auschwitz (2015), Gore Verbinski’s A Cure for Wellness (2016), and the supernatural drama Lights Out (2016). During the same stretch he also supplied additional music to 12 Years a Slave and The Little Prince.
In 2017 the Best Picture Oscar nominee Hidden Figures received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Original Score, credited to the team of Wallfisch, Zimmer, and Pharrell Williams, while the accompanying soundtrack earned a Grammy nomination. That same year brought four further releases whose scores appeared on Varèse Sarabande (Bitter Harvest), Silva Screen (Annabelle: Creation), WaterTower Music (It), and Epic (Blade Runner 2049), the last of which produced his second Grammy nomination shared with Hans Zimmer. The independent features Night Hunter and Serenity appeared in 2018, and 2019 saw the release of It Chapter Two along with the lighter Shazam! and the documentary series Hostile Planet.
