James studied the organ, flute and composition at the Royal
College of Music in London. Together with Kit
Hesketh-Harvey he won the 1987 Vivian Ellis Prize for young
writers for the musical stage with his first musical
Orlando.
Since then he has written extensively for the theatre,
including the stage musicals Killing Rasputin (Bridewell
Theatre), The Canterville Ghost (Britten Theatre), Inkle
and Yarico (Edinburgh Festival, Crampton Theatre,
Washington DC), Doctor Livingstone, I Presume . . .
(Riverside Studios) and New Edna, The Millennial Musical
(National tour and Haymarket Theatre, London) starring Dame
Edna Everage and the collaborative musicals The Challenge
and The Ten Commandments.
Incidental theatre music includes A Doll’s House
(Salisbury Playhouse), Blue Remembered Hills (Crucible
Theatre, Sheffield), The Merchant of Venice (Nottingham
Playhouse) as well as songs for Kit and the Widow Lavishly
Mounted (Ambassador’s Theatre) and The Fat Lady
Sings.
James has composed the scores for over 100 television
documentaries and dramas, - the Emmy Award winning Ten Days
to D-Day (Channel 4), Adolf and Eva (ITV network) which won
a Gold Badge at the New York Film Festival, In Search of
the Brontes (BBC1), World War One in Colour, The Real John
Betjeman, Kings and Queens, Last Train from Budapest, Great
Escapes, Who Killed Marilyn?, The Search for King Midas,
Britain’s Greatest Monarch, Timewatch: Exocet, The
Illuminator, The Real Benito Mussolini – to name but
a few, as well as the feature film Another Life, starring
Ioan Gruffudd, Nick Moran and Tom Wilkinson.
In 2004 James wrote and presented the Channel 4 documentary
What Made Mozart Tic?, a programme based on James’
belief that the great composer may have had
Tourette’s Syndrome. This excited a good deal of
interest and has been repeated a number of times.
James’ book Life, Interrupted, (Hodder/Headline) was
published in April 2006 and entered the bestseller lists in
its first week.
He
lives in Norfolk.