Biography
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Born
14 December 1946 (age 77)
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Born In
Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England, United Kingdom
John Du Prez (born Trevor Jones; 14 December 1946) is a British musician, conductor and composer. He was a member of the 1980s salsa-driven pop band Modern Romance and has since written several film scores including Oxford Blues (1984), Once Bitten, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990), and the final Carry On film, Carry On Columbus (1992). He contributed to The Wild (2006) soundtrack.
Du Prez was born in Sheffield, England. He received his MA (Oxon), B.Mus., ARCM, and was a Trevelyan Scholar at Christ Church, Oxford. In 1976 he joined the staff of the London University's Music Department before becoming a full-time composer. He would then begin a 30-year working relationship with Eric Idle.
Du Prez has often worked with Eric Idle for the music for Monty Python, most notably the score for Monty Python's The Meaning of Life as well as with John Cleese on A Fish Called Wanda. He acted as music arranger on the Terry Jones film Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979) and on the Terry Gilliam film Time Bandits (1981), the latter starring Sean Connery, and he also co-wrote the music for the stage musical Spamalot, as well as the music and the intro theme of the British series Captain Star. In 1986, Du Prez contributed songs to the soundtrack of the Madonna and Sean Penn movie Shanghai Surprise: "The Hottest Gong In Town" and "Zig-Zag" (both sung by the film's executive producer George Harrison).
The adoption of the name John Du Prez was to avoid confusion with the South African film composer Trevor Jones.He is probably best known as the trumpet and horn player in the 1980s Pop group Modern Romance, who had a string of Top 40 hits from 1981–83, and made many guest appearances on TV shows such as the BBC programme Top of the Pops.
John Du Prez has also scored various films including the Rob Lowe vehicle Oxford Blues (1984), the Comedy film A Private Function (1984), the Jim Carrey horror comedy Once Bitten (1985), and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movies; his piece of music - or Suite - Shredder's Suite is taken from the soundtrack to the first of the three films, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990).
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