Biography

Canadian born Andrew McKenna has been active in the UK music scene since returning from California in 2001.

Recent credits include Music Advisor and source music for Jane Eyre (2011: Director Cary Fukunaga), Piano Coach on The Debt (2011: Director John Madden), sound design and music composition for Wallace and Gromit present: A World of Cracking Ideas at the Science Museum, London, the film score for Robbie the Reindeer: Close Encounters of the Herd Kind for Comic Relief and the BBC, orchestrations for Cocciante's new opera popolare Giulietta e Romeo (world premiere in Verona, Italy), choral conducting for Roger Waters' opera Ca Ira, Poznan, Poland, and Kiev, Ukraine, the score for animated special effects film Spellbreaker 4D for LEGOLAND Parks, additional music for Dog Days of Summer (Director Mark Freiburger), Poirot: Death on the Nile (ITV), and The Prince and Me (Paramount), orchestrations for World Trade Center (Craig Armstrong), Goal! (Graeme Revell), vocal group Amici, Bride and Prejudice (Craig Pruess), Dalziel and Pascoe (Rick Wentworth), Mindhunters and Hotet (Tuomas Kantelinen), and transcription work on Ca Ira (Roger Waters), for Craig Armstrong, and George Fenton on The Blue Planet: Live!.

Composing credits include commissions for SeaLife Centre California, LEGOLAND Discovery Centres in Duisburg and Berlin, scores for Robbie the Reindeer: Close Encounters of the Herd Kind (Comic Relief/BBC), the animated special effects film Spellbreaker 4D (LEGOLAND Parks worldwide), episodic TV series 3 Day Weekend (Turner South Television), The Hostess (Team Pictures), The Witch of the Wildwoods (LEGO Company), Property Apocalypse Now (DMI Productions).

Session credits as pianist include Racing Stripes, Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, The Life and Death of Peter Sellers, Dalziel and Pascoe, Bailey's Billions and Bright Young Things.

Theatrical credits include ‘Alice’ (David Levin/Rick Wentworth) at the Bridewell Theatre, London; ‘Nunsense’, ‘The Best Little Whorehouse inTexas’ (at the Playhouse, Birmingham, Mich.), and ‘Durante: The Musical’ (Pianist and Assistant Conductor) touring from Toronto to Vancouver to San Francisco, and Los Angeles, where he made his conducting debut with the show.

Other performance credits include the Canadian premiere of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s "REQUIEM" with the Toronto Symphony and the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony Orchestras.

He has previously been a staff Music Production Director with Paramount Parks/Viacom, and creative director for LEGO Company developing the LEGOLAND Parks family entertainment program in England and California.

Musical training began at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto, (Associateship degree in Piano Performance), followed by Bachelor’s degree in Music Education from the University of Toronto, and a Bachelor of Education degree from the University of Western Ontario.

And yes, he's still a Canadian at heart. Ask him anything you like about the Leafs and the Blue Jays, but please don't get him started on Canadian politics. Or UK politics for that matter.