News December 2, 2020

Jed Kurzel, Amanda Brown, and François Tétaz among 2020 Screen Music Award winners

The first ever virtual Screen Music Awards were held last night and saw the prestigious Feature Film Score of the Year award taken out by Jed Kurzel for True History of the Kelly Gang, a film directed by his equally talented brother Justin Kurzel.

Jed has won Feature Film Score of the Year twice previously for Snowtown and Slow West. He also won the Overseas Recognition Award at the inaugural Global APRA Music Awards in London in March of this year.

“It’s a genuine honour,” Kurzel said in hi speech, beamed in from London. “It would be great to be there but unfortunately I’m stuck in the UK, under lockdown again, so there’s that.

“I’d like to thank Justin for being such an open and amazing collaborator. Robert Ames and Hugh Brunt and all the musicians at the LCO for their wonderful contribution to the score. Pete Cobbin and Kirsty Whalley for recording and mixing. Steve Single, everyone at Music Sales.

“All the producers, Hal, Liz, Justin, and basically everyone involved in making the film such a unique and really cool experience. And last but not least I’d love to thank my family for being so supportive along the way. I hope everyone has a great night, cheers!”

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Meanwhile, Amanda Brown won Best Music for a TV Series for Australian psychological drama The Secrets She Keeps, the Network Ten series based on the novel of the same name by Michael Robotham.

“Thank you so much APRA and AGSC for this award, and thank you to Lingo Pictures for making The Secrets She Keeps and also to Daniel Denholm for mixing and producing some of the music for me. I’m very happy, I think Slinky is too,” Brown said.

The Best Original Song Composed for the Screen goes to David Bridie and co-writer Tom Murray for Ballad of the Bridge Builders. The song, performed by Archie Roach, is from the film The Skin of Others, a story of modern Australia told through the extraordinary life of Aboriginal WW1 soldier Douglas Grant (c.1885-1951). David Bridie’s first Screen Music Award was in 2005 and in 2019, he took out the category of Best Music for a Documentary.

Grammy Award winning producer and screen composer François Tétaz has taken out the title of Best Soundtrack Album for Australian feature film Judy & Punch. The film’s score was nominated in 2019 for Feature Film Score of the Year and also won Best Original Score at the 2019 AACTA Awards.

Check out the 2020 Virtual Screen Music Awards:

The 2020 Screen Music Awards were hosted by Justine Clarke, Meyne Wyatt and Claudia Karvan. Musical Director Jessica Wells led an orchestra that performed each of the nominated Feature Film Score of the Year compositions.

The orchestra was joined by actress, singer and playwright Ursula Yovich for a performance of David Bridie and Tom Murray’s award-winning song Ballad of the Bridge Builders.

The orchestra closed the show with a special tribute to Distinguished Services recipient Nerida Tyson-Chew.