Bio
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James was born in Epsom in 1997. Although taught piano from an early age, his first tangible excitement about music was from listening to The Beach Boys in a pair of cheap headphones opening his ears to the world of music studios and life by the beach.
At 11 he began learning guitar and quickly formed a band with friends, performing locally and recording an EP. Throughout school he intended to follow a path in studio engineering, but during his A Levels was greatly impressed by late Romantic/Modernist composers and turned his attentions to composition. It was during this time that he wrote his first and longest single work, the 28 minute ‘Piano Quartet in Eb major’.
His straddling of the popular and classical music worlds informed his choice of university study and he opted for Sussex University; completing modules from both Music and Music Technology courses in order to gain a holistic musical education. He particularly enjoyed the courses combining elements of composition and recording.
Extracurricularly he began to meet budding directors and began scoring films, harnessing both compositional and recorded music elements to write for screen. This led to the scoring of a film by one of the film lecturers at the university, writing a 50s influenced score inspired by both Jazz and Classical artists of the era from Glen Miller to Ralph Vaughn-Williams.
In 2018 he was commissioned to write his first orchestral work (‘Haiku’) for the Thomas Tallis festival at the Attenborough Centre for the Creative Arts in Brighton. In September the same year James participated in a course run by Anton Lukoszevieze and Mira Benjamin in the Pyrenees where he researched experimental music from the 1950s - present day and both played and created a selection of non-traditional and graphic scores. In November he was selected to take part in the Contemporary Music Lab in Nicosia, Cyprus, writing for bassoon under the tutelage of Raphael Staubli, George Christofi and Andreas Papetrou.
James graduated from the University of Sussex with a first class degree, winning the David Osmond-Smith Prize for best dissertation as well as the Thomas Beecham award for contribution to music.
Since graduating, he has been writing and releasing music under the name James Longcake and with fusion project QWAK. He writes for a number of production music libraries including LIFT music, Hitpoint, Absolute Music Production and more. Additionally he produces, mixes and composes for a range of clients. To work with James, get in touch today.
At 11 he began learning guitar and quickly formed a band with friends, performing locally and recording an EP. Throughout school he intended to follow a path in studio engineering, but during his A Levels was greatly impressed by late Romantic/Modernist composers and turned his attentions to composition. It was during this time that he wrote his first and longest single work, the 28 minute ‘Piano Quartet in Eb major’.
His straddling of the popular and classical music worlds informed his choice of university study and he opted for Sussex University; completing modules from both Music and Music Technology courses in order to gain a holistic musical education. He particularly enjoyed the courses combining elements of composition and recording.
Extracurricularly he began to meet budding directors and began scoring films, harnessing both compositional and recorded music elements to write for screen. This led to the scoring of a film by one of the film lecturers at the university, writing a 50s influenced score inspired by both Jazz and Classical artists of the era from Glen Miller to Ralph Vaughn-Williams.
In 2018 he was commissioned to write his first orchestral work (‘Haiku’) for the Thomas Tallis festival at the Attenborough Centre for the Creative Arts in Brighton. In September the same year James participated in a course run by Anton Lukoszevieze and Mira Benjamin in the Pyrenees where he researched experimental music from the 1950s - present day and both played and created a selection of non-traditional and graphic scores. In November he was selected to take part in the Contemporary Music Lab in Nicosia, Cyprus, writing for bassoon under the tutelage of Raphael Staubli, George Christofi and Andreas Papetrou.
James graduated from the University of Sussex with a first class degree, winning the David Osmond-Smith Prize for best dissertation as well as the Thomas Beecham award for contribution to music.
Since graduating, he has been writing and releasing music under the name James Longcake and with fusion project QWAK. He writes for a number of production music libraries including LIFT music, Hitpoint, Absolute Music Production and more. Additionally he produces, mixes and composes for a range of clients. To work with James, get in touch today.
