Gravity bests U of T alumni Oscar nominees

Both of the University of Toronto’s Academy Awards nominees were shut out by Gravity at the Oscars last night.

Faculty of Music alumnus Owen Pallett, the renowned indie singer-songwriter and violinist, had been nominated for his contributions to the score of Spike Jonze’s film, Her while former Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering student Andy Koyama was up for his role in mixing the sound of the film, Lone Survivor. 

Both categories were won by the teams behind Alfonso Cuaron's Gravity. 

This is the second year in a row an alumnus was nominated for Best Original Score, with the 2013 Oscar being awarded to Mychael Danna for scoring Ang Lee’s Life of Pi. Danna and Pallett both graduated as specialists in music composition from U of T.

“Owen's innovative cross-over from classical training to indie performance to film composition reflects an important directional trend showing where music studies are taking our creative entrepreneurial graduates,” said Don McLean, dean of the Faculty of Music, upon learning of Pallet’s nod for his work alongside Arcade Fire’s William Butler.

Pallett is an internationally recognized artist whose work spans genres from classical to rock and pop. The Globe and Mail’s Brad Wheeler has described him as “a high-functioning prodigy who’s as comfortable arranging strings for Arcade Fire and Grizzly Bear as he is creating orchestral works for world-class symphonies.”

His credits include a win of the inaugural Polaris Prize in 2006 for a chamber-pop album; classical music commissions from London’s Barbican and the Toronto Symphony Orchestra; and collaborations with country star Taylor Swift, indie bands including Grizzly Bear and The National, and others.

"Owen was an extraordinary student with a remarkable background," said Gary Kulesha, an award-winning composer and one of Pallett's teachers at U of T. "His interests ranged everywhere. He was talented and focused, and never failed to challenge ideas if he had questions. Because of his amazing knowledge of traditional music, he actually played the onstage country fiddler in my opera, The Last Duel, in 2000. I am not at all surprised he has done well."

“Following last year's Golden Globe and Oscar win for Mychael Danna (BMus 1986) for Life of Pi, who was our inaugural Louis Applebaum Distinguished Visitor in Film Composition in 2011, and our emerging presence in composition for film and media through the teaching leadership of Eric Robertson, as well as partnerships with the Sheridan College animation program, the Screen Composers Guild of Canada and other organizations, we are starting to feel on a bit of a roll,” said the Faculty of Music's McLean.

Also nominated was re-recording mixer Andy Koyama, who studied Engineering Physics at the University of Toronto, and has enjoyed a successful career working on films including Twilight Saga: New Moon, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift and Peter Berg’s award-winning war drama starring Mark Wahlberg, Lone Survivor.

“The director wanted the soundtrack to be very raw and visceral, and we went to great lengths trying to emulate what it would feel like to be those Navy SEALs in the battle," Koyama told the Canadian Press last month. "Modern battle is very confusing and disorienting, so we used a lot of sound tricks to try to give the audience that experience."

Owen Pallett remains in the running for five Juno Awards as part of Arcade Fire, nominated in categories including Album of the Year and Group of the Year. The Juno Awards will be held in Winnipeg on March 30. (Read more about U of T's Juno nominations)