Carter Burwell (born November 18, 1955, in New York City, New York) is a composer of film soundtracks.

As a film composer, Burwell has had a long working relationship with film makers the Coen brothers, scoring every film they have made. He enjoys working with leftfield directors and has also scored all of Spike Jonze's films. Among his best known non-Coen Brothers film scores are And the Band Played On (1993), Conspiracy Theory (1997) and The Spanish Prisoner (1997), Hamlet (2000), Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead (2007), In Bruges (2008) and Twilight (The Score) (2008).

In April 2005, Burwell composed and conducted music, performed by The Parabola Ensemble, for the plays « Sawbones » written and directed by the Coen Brothers, « Hope Leaves the Theater » written and directed by Charlie Kaufman and « Anomalisa » written and directed by Francis Fregoli. This was a segment of the sound-only production Theater of the New Ear, which debuted at St. Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn, NY with support from Sirius Satellite Radio, United Talent Agency and Sony Pictures.

He recently created a track called « Bella’s Lullaby » for the film Twilight (2008). The soundtrack released on November 4, 2008.

Burwell married Christine Sciulli in 1999.

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Burwell started out as an arranger for rock bands in his native New York. Besides his work for film - for which he is best known - Burwell was one half of avant-pop duo Thick Pigeon with songwriter Stanton Miranda, with whom he still occasionally records (notably on the soundtrack to 'Psycho III'). Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.