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Jeff Russo

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Jeff Russo
Background information
OriginUnited States
GenresRock, acoustic rock
Occupation(s)Composer, songwriter, guitarist, vocalist, music producer
Years active1993–present
Websitejeffrusso.com

Jeff Russo (born August 31) is an American composer, songwriter, guitarist, vocalist and music producer, and one of the two founding members of the rock band Tonic. He is also a founding member of acoustic rock band Low Stars.

Russo is also known for his work as composer on various films and television series, notably Snowfall, Fargo, Legion, and Counterpart, as well as the Star Trek series Star Trek: Discovery, Star Trek: Picard, and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, and For All Mankind. He also scored the miniseries The Night Of and the acclaimed video game What Remains of Edith Finch. For his work on Fargo, he won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Composition for a Limited Series, Movie, or Special in 2017.

Biography

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Russo began his music career as a rock musician, co-founding the band Tonic. In 2006 he was invited (by his friends, Wendy & Lisa) to assist in the studio while they worked on multiple film and TV projects and he realized how much he enjoyed the process.[1] He currently scores two Peabody Award nominated shows: CBS’s Star Trek: Discovery and FX’s Legion, starring Dan Stevens and Aubrey Plaza. He also scores Netflix’s The Umbrella Academy starring Elliot Page, Robert Sheehan and Mary J. Blige, based on the popular comic book series by Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba. He wrote for Noah Hawley’s feature directorial debut from Fox Searchlight, Lucy in the Sky, starring Natalie Portman and Jon Hamm, and Altered Carbon, an adaptation of Richard K. Morgan’s sci-fi novel. His film work includes scoring Mark Wahlberg’s action-thriller film Mile 22, Craig Macneill’s Lizzie, starring Chloë Sevigny and Kristen Stewart, which premiered at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival, and Jon Avnet’s Three Christs, starring Richard Gere, which premiered at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival. [2] His first connection with the Star Trek franchise was his contribution to Star Trek: Discovery.[1]

Russo and his wife, musician Nina Gordon of the band Veruca Salt, have two children.

Albums

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Tonic

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Year Album
1996 Lemon Parade
1999 Live and Enhanced
Sugar
2002 Head on Straight
2009 A Casual Affair: The Best of Tonic
2010 Tonic
2016 Lemon Parade Revisited

Guest appearance

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Year Album
2016 TAMA GIRARD "When I Think of You" (Single)

Low Stars

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Year Album
2007 Calling All Friends EP
Low Stars

Solo

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Year Album
2007-2008 Make Me Feel Good About Me (unreleased)

Soundtracks

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Film

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Year Title Director(s) Notes
2004 Ghost Game Joe Knee
2010 Lesson Plan Philip Neel
David H. Jeffery
2012 About Cherry Stephen Elliott
Watercolor Postcards Rajeev Dassani
2013 Free Ride Shana Betz
Bad Behaviour Nicholas Brandt
Lisa Hamil
2014 The Surface Gil Cates Jr.
2017 Hondros Greg Campbell Documentary film
Three Christs Jon Avnet
Submission Richard Levine
2018 Lizzie Craig William Macneill
Mile 22 Peter Berg
2019 Lucy in the Sky Noah Hawley
2020 Lorelei Sabrina Doyle
2022 American Dreamer Paul Dektor
2023 What You Wish For Nicholas Tomnay Co-composed with Tracie Turnbull
Canary Danny O'Malley
Alex Rivest
Documentary film
Co-composed with Paul Doucette
2024 Rob Peace Chiwetel Ejiofor

Television

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Year Series Notes
2009 The Unusuals
2010 My Generation
2011-2013 Necessary Roughness Scored 16 episodes
2013-2014 Hostages Composed with Ben Decter
2014-present Fargo
2014-2020 Power
2015 Tut Miniseries
Manhattan
The Returned With Zoë Keating
2016 American Gothic
The Night Of Miniseries
2016-present Lucifer Composed with Ben Decter
Replaced Marco Beltrami and Dennis Smith for Season 2 onwards
2016-2018 Channel Zero
2017-2018 Ghosted
2017-2019 Legion
2017-present Snowfall
Star Trek: Discovery Original Star Trek Theme by Alexander Courage
2017-2019 Counterpart
2018-2020 Altered Carbon
Star Trek: Short Treks[3] Original Star Trek Theme by Alexander Courage
Composed main theme and the score for the first season along with the music for "Children of Mars" from the second season. The rest of the second season continued to use Russo's title theme but the scores were otherwise composed by various composers including Kris Bowers, Nami Melumad and others, with Michael Giacchino serving as supervising composer and writing the music for the short that he directed.
2018 Waco Miniseries. Co-composed with Jordan Gagne
Santa Clarita Diet Composed 2nd and 3rd season. 1st season composed by John Debney
2019-present The Umbrella Academy
For All Mankind
2019 The Act
The InBetween
Treadstone Original Bourne themes by John Powell. Co-composed with Jordan Gagne
2020-2022 Star Trek: Picard Composed first two seasons. Third and final one was composed by Stephen Barton and Frederik Wiedmann
2020 Warrior Nun
Cursed Composed theme
Brave New World Co-composed with Jordan Gagne
Utopia
2021 Clarice
Oslo Television film. Co-composed with Zoë Keating
Brand New Cherry Flavor Miniseries
2022 Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Composed main theme
Bosch: Legacy
2023 Love & Death Miniseries
Mrs. Davis Limited series
2024 Ripley Limited series

Video games

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Year Title Studio Notes
2017 What Remains of Edith Finch Giant Sparrow Nominated — BAFTA Game Award for Best Music
2018 Madden NFL 18 Electronic Arts Story mode Longshot

References

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  1. ^ a b Eric Molinsky (October 27, 2022). "Songs in the Key of SF". Imaginary Worlds Ep. 210. Retrieved October 27, 2022.
  2. ^ "Jeff Russo Biography". Jeff Russo. Retrieved July 12, 2019.
  3. ^ Ulster, Laurie. "Interview: Composer Jeff Russo Talks About The Challenges Of Scoring 'Star Trek: Short Treks'". TrekMovie.com. Retrieved October 8, 2019.
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