Paul Grabowsky
Encyclopedia
Biography
Grabowsky was born on 27 September 1958 in LaeLae
Lae, the capital of Morobe Province, is the second-largest city in Papua New Guinea. It is located at the start of the Highlands Highway which is the main land transport corridor from the Highlands region to the coast...
, Papua New Guinea; his father Alistair had lived in Papua New Guinea with his wife Charlotte since the 1930s working on oil rigs, building roads, flying planes and playing the drums. His older brother Michael (born 1942) is also a musician (bass guitar) and worked as music coordinator/producer on some of Paul's films.
Grabowsky grew up in Glen Waverley
Glen Waverley, Victoria
Glen Waverley is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 19 km south-east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Monash...
and began piano lessons when he was five years old. He studied the classical repertoire with Mack Jost, senior lecturer in piano at the Conservatorium of Music at the University of Melbourne
University of Melbourne
The University of Melbourne is a public university located in Melbourne, Victoria. Founded in 1853, it is the second oldest university in Australia and the oldest in Victoria...
from the age of seven until his university years. He attended Wesley College
Wesley College, Melbourne
Wesley College, Melbourne is an independent, co-educational, Christian day school in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Established in 1866, the college is a school of the Uniting Church in Australia. Wesley is the largest school in Australia by enrolment, with 3,511 students and 564 full-time staff...
and it was that school's jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
band which introduced him to the genre.
1980s
Immersing himself in jazz, Grabowsky dropped out of university. In 1978–1980 he worked in the Melbourne cabaretCabaret
Cabaret is a form, or place, of entertainment featuring comedy, song, dance, and theatre, distinguished mainly by the performance venue: a restaurant or nightclub with a stage for performances and the audience sitting at tables watching the performance, as introduced by a master of ceremonies or...
/comedy scene where he began his relationship with Steve Vizard
Steve Vizard
Stephen William Vizard, born 6 March 1956 in Richmond, Victoria, is an Australian media personality, comedian, businessman and writer.-Early life:...
and Robyn Archer
Robyn Archer
Robyn Archer AO CdOAL is an Australian singer, writer, stage and director, artistic director, and public advocate of the arts, in Australia and internationally.-Life:Archer was born Robyn Smith in Prospect, South Australia...
. Assisted by a grant from the Australia Council for the Arts, he flew in 1980 to London where he travelled via Spain to Germany; he lived there in Munich until 1985. He had been back in Australia for Christmas 1982/83 when, on the invitation of Red Symons
Red Symons
Redmond Symons is an Australian musician, writer, actor and radio host, probably best known as lead guitarist with Skyhooks and as the snide judge of "Red Faces", a segment of the long-running Hey Hey It's Saturday variety television show...
, he co-composed his first film score.
After his return to Australia in 1986, he played in various jazz ensembles, including The Wizards of Oz and the Groovematics; the latter played for three years on the TV
Network Ten
Network Ten , is one of Australia's three major commercial television networks. Owned-and-operated stations can be found in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth, while affiliates extend the network to cover most of the country...
show Tonight Live with Steve Vizard
Tonight Live With Steve Vizard
Tonight Live with Steve Vizard was a nightly Australian comedy chat show broadcast on Seven Network in Australia. It was a one hour live studio based show broadcast nationally 5 nights a week from February 1990 to November 1993, usually commencing at 10.30 pm every week night...
. He also founded The Paul Grabowsky Trio with Gary Costello (bass) and Allan Browne (drums), which won ARIA Music Awards
ARIA Music Awards
The Australian Recording Industry Association Music Awards is an annual series of awards nights celebrating the Australian music industry, put on by the Australian Recording Industry Association...
for its first CD (Six By Three) and in 1996 for its second CD, When Words Fail. During this time, he also wrote the score to the film The Last Days of Chez Nous
The Last Days of Chez Nous
The Last Days of Chez Nous is an Australian drama, directed by Gillian Armstrong and written by Helen Garner. Made in a style which emphasizes naturalism over melodrama, the film centres around what happens after Vicki arrives at the house of her older sister Beth, whose French husband falls for her...
and for television shows like Phoenix
Phoenix (TV series)
Phoenix is an Australian police drama television series. Phoenix screened as two thirteen-part series on Australian Broadcasting Corporation in 1992 and 1993....
, Janus
Janus (TV series)
Janus is an Australian drama television series screened on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in 1994 and 1995. Two series were produced, with a total of 26 episodes....
and Fast Forward.
1990s
In 1990 he was commissioned to write several pieces for the Munich-based jazz/contemporary music group Die Konferenz. One group of these was based on songs of Édith PiafÉdith Piaf
Édith Piaf , born Édith Giovanna Gassion, was a French singer and cultural icon who became widely regarded as France's greatest popular singer. Her singing reflected her life, with her specialty being ballads...
, while a second group was based on songs from German UFA
Universum Film AG
Universum Film AG, better known as UFA or Ufa, is a film company that was the principal film studio in Germany, home of the German film industry during the Weimar Republic and through World War II, and a major force in world cinema from 1917 to 1945...
films from the 1920s–1940s . With the support from its artistic director Richard Wherrett
Richard Wherrett
Richard Bruce Wherrett AM was an influential and successful Australian theatrical director, whose career spanned 40 years.Richard Wherrett was born in 1940...
, this led to the formation of the project Ringing the Bell Backwards at the Melbourne International Arts Festival
Melbourne International Arts Festival
Melbourne Festival is a celebration of dance, theatre, music, visual arts, multimedia, outdoor and free events held for 17 days each October in a number of venues across Melbourne, Australia.-History:...
and eventually to the Australian Art Orchestra in 1994. That year, Grabowsky wrote a piano concerto for Michael Kieran Harvey
Michael Kieran Harvey
Michael Kieran Harvey is an Australian pianist whose career has been notable for its diversity and wide repertoire. He is renowned for commissioning and performing new music. He has especially promoted the works of Australian composers, such as Carl Vine, all of whose piano music he has recorded...
.
In 1991 his first child was born, her name is Isabella Louise. His son Guy Alistair was born in 1995.
In 1995, the orchestra toured Europe, and later India in 1996. Grabowsky directed the Victorian Arts Centre
The Arts Centre (Melbourne)
The Victorian Arts Centre is a performing arts centre consisting of a complex of theatres and concert halls in the Melbourne Arts Precinct, located in the inner Melbourne suburb of Southbank in Victoria, Australia....
's Summer Music programme,. Late that year he was commissioned to front the 14-part ABC TV
ABC1
ABC1 was a United Kingdom based television channel from Disney using the branding of the Disney owned American network, ABC.The channel initially launched exclusively on the British digital terrestrial television platform Freeview on 27 September 2004. On 10 December 2004 it was launched on...
series Access All Areas. As Commissioning Editor for ABC Television Arts and Entertainment (1996–1998), he commissioned the documentary series A Long Way to the Top. During the late 1990s, Grabowsky concentrated on writing music for film and television: Molokai
Father Damien
Father Damien or Saint Damien of Molokai, SS.CC. , born Jozef De Veuster, was a Roman Catholic priest from Belgium and member of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, a missionary religious order...
(1999) and Innocence (2000) by Paul Cox
Paul Cox
Paulus Henriqus Benedictus "Paul" Cox is an award-winning Australian film director.Cox was born in Venlo, Limburg, the Netherlands, the son of Else , a native of Germany, and Wim Cox, a documentary film producer. Cox emigrated to Australia in 1965...
, Siam Sunset by John Polsen, the NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
mini-series Noah's Ark, the UK production Shiner
Shiner (2000 film)
Shiner is a 2000 released film written by Scott Cherry and directed by John Irvin and starred Michael Caine and Martin Landau.The story centers on Billy "Shiner" Simpson, played by Caine, a boxing promoter whose promising son he represents is killed. Simpson suspects a rival played by Landau and...
. Northern Rivers Performing Arts (NORPA) commissioned his first opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
, The Mercenary with a (libretto
Libretto
A libretto is the text used in an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata, or musical. The term "libretto" is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major liturgical works, such as mass, requiem, and sacred cantata, or even the story line of a...
by Janis Balodis).
2000s
In 2000, the project The Theft of Sita came to fruition; it combined jazz elements, Balinese gamelanGamelan
A gamelan is a musical ensemble from Indonesia, typically from the islands of Bali or Java, featuring a variety of instruments such as metallophones, xylophones, drums and gongs; bamboo flutes, bowed and plucked strings. Vocalists may also be included....
music and puppetry
Puppetry
Puppetry is a form of theatre or performance which involves the manipulation of puppets. It is very ancient, and is believed to have originated 30,000 years BC. Puppetry takes many forms but they all share the process of animating inanimate performing objects...
. The piece premiered in Adelaide, and has since toured worldwide. In that year, Grabowsky was also involved in the ceremonies of the Sydney Olympics
2000 Summer Olympics
The Sydney 2000 Summer Olympic Games or the Millennium Games/Games of the New Millennium, officially known as the Games of the XXVII Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event which was celebrated between 15 September and 1 October 2000 in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia...
and the Paralympics
2000 Summer Paralympics
The 2000 Paralympic Games were held in Sydney, Australia, from 18 October to 29 October. The eleventh Summer Paralympic Games, an estimated 3800 athletes took part in the Sydney programme. They commenced with the opening ceremony on 18 October 2000...
. Since then, he has written the opera Love in the Age of Therapy (libretto by Joanna Murray-Smith
Joanna Murray-Smith
Joanna Murray-Smith is a Melbourne based playwright, screenwriter, novelist, librettist and newspaper columnist.-Biography:...
) and the symphony Streets of Hurqalya (26 June 2002), commissioned by the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra is an orchestra based in Melbourne, Australia. It has 100 permanent musicians. Melbourne has the longest continuous history of orchestral music of any Australian city and the MSO is the oldest professional orchestra in Australia...
. Among his recent film scores are Fred Schepisi's Last Orders
Last Orders
Last Orders is a 1996 Booker Prize-winning novel by British author Graham Swift. In 2001 it was adapted for the film Last Orders by Australian writer and director Fred Schepisi.-Plot summary:...
and It Runs in the Family
It Runs in the Family (2003 film)
It Runs in the Family is a 2003 comedy-drama movie directed by Fred Schepisi and starring three generations of the Douglas family: Kirk Douglas, his son Michael Douglas, and Michael's son Cameron Douglas, who play three generations of a family....
, Paul Cox
Paul Cox
Paulus Henriqus Benedictus "Paul" Cox is an award-winning Australian film director.Cox was born in Venlo, Limburg, the Netherlands, the son of Else , a native of Germany, and Wim Cox, a documentary film producer. Cox emigrated to Australia in 1965...
's The Diaries of Vaslav Nijinsky
Vaslav Nijinsky
Vaslav Nijinsky was a Russian ballet dancer and choreographer of Polish descent, cited as the greatest male dancer of the 20th century. He grew to be celebrated for his virtuosity and for the depth and intensity of his characterizations...
, and Disney
DisneyToon Studios
DisneyToon Studios is an American animation studio owned by The Walt Disney Company, responsible for producing direct-to-video and occasional theatrical films for Walt Disney Studios....
's The Jungle Book 2
The Jungle Book 2
The Jungle Book 2 is a 2003 American animated film produced by the DisneyToons studio in Sydney, Australia and released by Walt Disney Pictures and Buena Vista Distribution. The theatrical version of the film was released in France on February 5, 2003, and released in the United States on February...
. From 2003 to 2007, Grabowsky was commissioner at the Australian Film Commission
Australian Film Commission
The Australian Film Commission was an Australian government agency with a mandate to promote the creation and distribution of films in Australia as well as to preserve the country's film history. It also had a production arm responsible for production and commissioning of films for government...
. In 2004 he became involved in Charles Darwin University
Charles Darwin University
Charles Darwin University is an Australian public university with about 20,000 students in 2007.The University offers a wide range of Higher Education degrees and Vocational Education and Training courses with flexible study options, including part-time, external and online.CDU has campuses in the...
’s Remote Indigenous Music Program.
In 2005 Paul Grabowsky was appointed Artistic Director for the Queensland Music Festival
Queensland Music Festival
The Queensland Music Festival is a series of musical events staged in a number of locations in Queensland, Australia usually around late July, every second year. It is financially supported by the Queensland Government through Arts Queensland and a wide range of other partners...
2007. His song cycle
Song cycle
A song cycle is a group of songs designed to be performed in a sequence as a single entity. As a rule, all of the songs are by the same composer and often use words from the same poet or lyricist. Unification can be achieved by a narrative or a persona common to the songs, or even, as in Schumann's...
Before Time Could Change Us, lyrics by Dorothy Porter
Dorothy Porter
Dorothy Featherstone Porter was an Australian poet.-Early life:Porter was born in Sydney. Her father was barrister Chester Porter and her mother, Jean, was a high school chemistry teacher. Porter attended the Queenwood School for Girls...
and featuring Katie Noonan
Katie Noonan
Katie Anne Noonan is an Australian singer-songwriter. In addition to a successful solo career encompassing opera, jazz, pop, rock and dance, she sings in the groups george and Elixir, duets with her mother, Maggie Noonan and is currently playing with support from the group The...
, was commissioned by the Queensland Music Festival and released in 2005 by the Warner Music Group
Warner Music Group
Warner Music Group is the third largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry, making it one of the big four record companies...
. He recorded an album of original jazz compositions, Tales of Time and Space, with Branford Marsalis
Branford Marsalis
Branford Marsalis is an American saxophonist, composer and bandleader. While primarily known for his work in jazz as the leader of the Branford Marsalis Quartet, he also performs frequently as a soloist with classical ensembles and has led the group Buckshot LeFonque.-Biography:Marsalis was born...
(soprano sax), Joe Lovano
Joe Lovano
Joseph Salvatore "Joe" Lovano is a post bop jazz saxophonist, alto clarinetist, flautist, and drummer. Since the late 1980s, Lovano has been one of the world's premiere tenor saxophone players, earning a Grammy award and several nods on Down Beat magazine's critics' and readers' polls...
(tenor sax), Scott Tinkler (trumpet), Ed Schuller (bass) and Jeff "Tain" Watts (drums). In 2007 he was appointed inaugural patron of the National Film and Sound Archive
National Film and Sound Archive
The National Film and Sound Archive is Australia’s audiovisual archive, responsible for developing, preserving, maintaining, promoting and providing access to a national collection of audiovisual materials and related items...
's project Sounds of Australia. On 4 January 2008, the Adelaide Festival of Arts
Adelaide Festival of Arts
The Adelaide Festival of Arts is an arts festival held biennially in the South Australian capital of Adelaide. Although locally considered to be one of the world's greatest celebrations of the arts, that is internationally renowned and the pre-eminent cultural event in Australia, it is actually...
appointed
Paul Grabowsky as the Artistic Director for the 2010 Adelaide Bank Festival of Arts, its 50th anniversary year.
Awards
- 1988 ARIA AwardARIA Music AwardsThe Australian Recording Industry Association Music Awards is an annual series of awards nights celebrating the Australian music industry, put on by the Australian Recording Industry Association...
for the album Soundtrack - 1988 & 1989 Rolling StoneRolling StoneRolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
Magazine (Australia) Jazz Artist of the Year - 1989 APRA AwardAPRA AwardsThe APRA Music Awards are several award ceremonies run in Australia and New Zealand by Australasian Performing Right Association to recognise songwriting skills, sales and airplay performance by its members annually....
(Most Performed Australasian Jazz Work) for Disappearing Shoreline - 1989 ARIA nomination for the film GeorgiaGeorgia (1988 film)Georgia is a 1988 Australian thriller film directed by Ben Lewin starring Judy Davis and John Bach.Judy Davis plays the two roles of a mother, Georgia, and her daughter Nina...
- 1989 AFIAustralian Film Institute AwardsThe Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts Award, known as the AACTA Award , is an accolade presented annually by the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts . The awards recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry and television industry, including directors,...
nomination (Best Original Music Score) for Georgia - 1990 ARIA Award for the album Six By Three
- 1991 ARIA nomination for the film A Woman's TaleA Woman's TaleA Woman's Tale is a 1991 Australian film directed by Paul Cox. It stars Sheila Florance, Gosia Dobrowolska, Norman Kaye, Chris Haywood and Ernie Gray.Martha is an elderly woman living alone in her flat and dying of cancer...
- 1991 AFI nomination (Best Music Score) for A Woman's Tale
- 1992 ARIA nomination for the film The Last Days of Chez NousThe Last Days of Chez NousThe Last Days of Chez Nous is an Australian drama, directed by Gillian Armstrong and written by Helen Garner. Made in a style which emphasizes naturalism over melodrama, the film centres around what happens after Vicki arrives at the house of her older sister Beth, whose French husband falls for her...
- 1992 AFI nomination (Best Music Score) for The Last Days of Chez Nous
- 1993 ARIA nomination for Tee Vee
- 1993 APRA Award for PhoenixPhoenix (TV series)Phoenix is an Australian police drama television series. Phoenix screened as two thirteen-part series on Australian Broadcasting Corporation in 1992 and 1993....
- 1994 ARIA nomination for the film Exile
- 1994 AFI nomination (Best Original Music Score) for Exile
- 1995 ARIA nomination for the film Mushrooms
- 1995 AFI Award (Open Craft Award) for The Good Looker
- 1996 ARIA Award (Best Australian Jazz Release) for When Words Fail
- 1998 ARIA nomination for Angel
- 1999 Australian Guild of Screen Composers nomination for the film Siam Sunset
- 2000 ARIA nomination for the film Siam Sunset
- 2000 The AgeThe AgeThe Age is a daily broadsheet newspaper, which has been published in Melbourne, Australia since 1854. Owned and published by Fairfax Media, The Age primarily serves Victoria, but is also available for purchase in Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory and border regions of South Australia and...
Award (Best Production) for The Theft of Sita - 2001 ARIA nomination for PG3
- 2001 Sidney MyerSidney MyerSidney Baevski Myer was a Russian Australian businessman and philanthropist, best known for creating Myer, Australia's largest chain of department stores.-Early life:...
Performing Artist of the Year Award - 2001 Helpmann Award (Best Original Score) for The Theft of Sita
- 2004 ARIA nomination for Tales of Time and Space
- 2003 World Soundtrack AcademyWorld Soundtrack AcademyThe World Soundtrack Academy , launched in 2001 by the Flanders International Film Festival Ghent, is aimed at organizing and overseeing the educational, cultural and professional aspects of the art of film music, including the preservation of the history of the soundtrack and its worldwide promotion...
nomination for The Jungle Book 2The Jungle Book 2The Jungle Book 2 is a 2003 American animated film produced by the DisneyToons studio in Sydney, Australia and released by Walt Disney Pictures and Buena Vista Distribution. The theatrical version of the film was released in France on February 5, 2003, and released in the United States on February... - 2004 AFI (Open Craft Award) nomination for Jessica
- 2005 ARIA Award for Before Time Could Change Us
- 2006 AFI nomination for Unfolding Florence: The Many Lives of Florence BroadhurstUnfolding Florence: The Many Lives of Florence BroadhurstUnfolding Florence: The Many Lives of Florence Broadhurst, also known as A Colourful Life, is a 2006 documentary/drama based on the life of Florence Broadhurst. Starring Felicity Price, the film was written by Katherine Thomson and directed by Gillian Armstrong...
- 2006 Bell Award Australian Jazz Artist of The Year
- 2007 Melbourne Prize for Music
Sources
- M. Wangler: Gleichberechtigte Rollenverteilung: Paul Grabowsky, Jazz Podium, xxxiv/7 (1985), 4
- Roger T. Dean: "Grabowsky, Paul", Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy (Accessed 16 March 2008), http://www.grovemusic.com
External links
- Home page
- The Australian Art Orchestra
- "Introducing... Paul Grabowsky" at the State Library of QueenslandState Library of QueenslandThe State Library of Queensland is a large public library provided to the people of the State of Queensland, Australia, by the state government. Its legislative basis is provided by the Queensland Libraries Act 1988...