| Biography | Johnny Hawksworth (2 February 1924) is a British musician and composer who has lived and worked in Australia since 1984.
Hawksworth initially trained as a pianist, but also played double bass for Britain's leading big band the Ted Heath Orchestra during the early 1950s and through the 1960s. During this time he became one of the most popular jazz bassists in the UK, winning many polls and was often featured as a soloist on Heath concerts and recordings. He is probably best known, however, for his short compositions for television. These include Salute to Thames (the famous identity tune for Thames Television) and also the theme tunes for the 1970s series Roobarb, George and Mildred and Man About the House. He also contributed some of the incidental music used in the 1967 Spider-Man cartoon. (Although originating from the United States, Spider-Man had most of its incidental music supplied by Irish composers, such as Phil Coulter, who was Londonderry in Northern Ireland, and British including Syd Dale, Alan Hawkshaw, David Lindup, Bill Martin and Johnny Pearson.)
Hawksworth has also written many pieces of stock music for the De Wolfe Music library. He also provided the hypnotic musical soundtrack to Geoffrey Jones' classic British Transport Film "Snow" (1963). |