Donald Sturrock
Born in 1961, and grew up in England and South America. After reading Modern History at Oxford University, he joined BBC Television's Music and Arts Department where he worked full-time as writer, producer and director until 1992.
At the BBC he worked with many of the world's leading musicians, including Solti, von Karajan, Richter, Menuhin, Gergiev and Tennstedt, making a number of original, intense and highly-acclaimed music documentaries with them. These included After the Storm, an intimate and revealing portrait of the final years of the composer Bela Bartok, which won the 1989 Hungarian President's Prize; Six Foot Cinderella, a fantasy about the life of the operatic bass Robert Lloyd; and Words Return to Music, an exploration of the life, music and philosophy of the Russian composer Alfred Schnittke.
In 1992, he wrote and directed The Graham Greene Trilogy for BBC2's ARENA series. This three-hour programme, narrated by Sir Alec Guinness, and first broadcast in 1993, received outstanding reviews in the British and European press. It was described by David Gritten in the Daily Telegraph as a "towering achievement... British television at its absolute peak". The Broadcasting Writers Guild voted it Best Documentary of 1993.
Sturrock has a long relationship with the writing of Roald Dahl. In 1985, he made a short film about Dahl for the BBC and in Spring 1998, he completed a full-length documentary about him. Since 1992, he has been Artistic Director of the Roald Dahl Foundation, commissioning composers Paul Patterson, Eleanor Alberga, Kurt Schwertsik, Vladimir Tarnopolski, Tobias Picker, Peter Ash, and Georgs Pelecis in musical adaptations of Dahl's children's stories. These have included: Little Red Riding Hood, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Goldilocks, The Minpins, and Jack and the Beanstalk. In 1995 Sturrock directed an award-winning television version of Little Red Riding Hood with Danny DeVito, Ian Holm and Julie Walters.
Sturrock has also written and directed a four-part BBC documentary series, Placido Domingo's Tales at the Opera, including films about the Metropolitan Opera in New York, the Wiener Staatsoper and the LA Opera, as well as The Art of Singing and the Grammy award nominated The Art of Piano for Ideale Audience and Warner Home Video.
At the BBC he worked with many of the world's leading musicians, including Solti, von Karajan, Richter, Menuhin, Gergiev and Tennstedt, making a number of original, intense and highly-acclaimed music documentaries with them. These included After the Storm, an intimate and revealing portrait of the final years of the composer Bela Bartok, which won the 1989 Hungarian President's Prize; Six Foot Cinderella, a fantasy about the life of the operatic bass Robert Lloyd; and Words Return to Music, an exploration of the life, music and philosophy of the Russian composer Alfred Schnittke.
In 1992, he wrote and directed The Graham Greene Trilogy for BBC2's ARENA series. This three-hour programme, narrated by Sir Alec Guinness, and first broadcast in 1993, received outstanding reviews in the British and European press. It was described by David Gritten in the Daily Telegraph as a "towering achievement... British television at its absolute peak". The Broadcasting Writers Guild voted it Best Documentary of 1993.
Sturrock has a long relationship with the writing of Roald Dahl. In 1985, he made a short film about Dahl for the BBC and in Spring 1998, he completed a full-length documentary about him. Since 1992, he has been Artistic Director of the Roald Dahl Foundation, commissioning composers Paul Patterson, Eleanor Alberga, Kurt Schwertsik, Vladimir Tarnopolski, Tobias Picker, Peter Ash, and Georgs Pelecis in musical adaptations of Dahl's children's stories. These have included: Little Red Riding Hood, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Goldilocks, The Minpins, and Jack and the Beanstalk. In 1995 Sturrock directed an award-winning television version of Little Red Riding Hood with Danny DeVito, Ian Holm and Julie Walters.
Sturrock has also written and directed a four-part BBC documentary series, Placido Domingo's Tales at the Opera, including films about the Metropolitan Opera in New York, the Wiener Staatsoper and the LA Opera, as well as The Art of Singing and the Grammy award nominated The Art of Piano for Ideale Audience and Warner Home Video.
Donald Sturrock
Director / Producer
Director / Producer
Music Link International
