Obituary, Christopher Gunning (1944-2023)

The widely acclaimed English composer and conductor Christopher Gunning, known for both his film and television music and his symphonic orchestral compositions, has died at the age of 78.

Born in Cheltenham and schooled in composition by, among others, Edmund Rubbra and Richard Rodney Bennett, Gunning devoted much of his career to music for the screen. From acerbic Oxbridge satire Porterhouse Blue to dystopian visions of the future in Cold Lazarus and Knights of God, and from the comic caper Ooh… You Are Awful to the nature documentary Wild Africa, he could – and did – turn his hand to almost any genre.

As Gunning’s talent became apparent, awards quickly followed – including for the 2007 Piaf biopic La Vie en Rose, for his extensive work on the Poirot franchise, for which he composed almost all the music, and a hat-trick of Ivor Novellos for the 1991 erotic drama Under Suspicion, 1997 du Maurier-based miniseries Rebecca, and period romance Firelight from the same year. Still further accolades came his way via collaborations with musicians from well outside the classical sphere – especially singer-songwriters Colin Blunstone and Lynsey De Paul, for both of whom he provided string arrangements that helped to create their songs’ instantly recognisable sound.

Colin Blunstone’s Say You Don’t Mind.

The concert-hall aspect of Gunning’s work may not have reached as many living-rooms as his screen soundtracks, but it was nonetheless significant – twelve symphonies and multiple concertos, as well as chamber music, all written in an exploratory yet tonal idiom blending echoes of Arnold, Sibelius and Walton. Perhaps not surprisingly for someone so experienced in capturing the subtle nuances of a film or television scene in music, Gunning’s skill at creating atmosphere in just a few instrumental brushstrokes is particularly remarkable. Although they certainly aren’t based on his screen compositions and should be considered as serious works on their own merit, several of his symphonies (Nos. 2 and 5 especially) open in such evocative shadow that a listener aware of the other side of Gunning’s compositional life can’t help but supply, in their mind’s eye, the visuals associated with a cloak-and-dagger murder mystery. At the other end of the scale, his flute concertino is a deliberately light-hearted, untroubled work in which Gunning responds to the dedicatee's "quietly wicked sense of humour".

Much of Gunning’s symphonic output has been recorded on Signum Records, with the composer himself taking the podium for some of the performances; these recordings have done much to refocus attention on this facet of his musicianship. Although the full symphony cycle has yet to be completed, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and BBC National Orchestra of Wales’s accounts of eight of his symphonies and six of his concertos still represent a profound legacy.

Gunning is survived by his four daughters, among them the Sweden-based professional oboist Verity Gunning-Olson.

Christopher Gunning - a selected discography