OVERVIEW

Anne-Kathrin Elisabeth Dern (*July 30, 1987) is a German film composer and CEO of e-Quality Music Productions LLC, currently residing in Los Angeles, California. She is mostly known for her scores to several Netflix titles (Fearless (2020), The Claus Family 1-3 (2020-2022)), Disney's Four Enchanted Sisters (2020), and SONY's Help I Shrunk My Parents (2018), as well as her video game work for iGG (Castle Clash (2019), Lords Mobile (2018), Galaxy Mobile (2020)), Tencent Games (Honor of Kings (2022)), and Riot Games (League of Legends (2022)). Dern also contributed music to both seasons of ABC's musical comedy series Galavant (2015-2016), Microsoft's HALO V: Guardians (2015), and the animated movie Leap! (2016). She has collaborated with and assisted composers such as Christopher Lennertz, Klaus Badelt, Alan Menken, Steve Jablonsky, Ryan Shore, William Ross, and Pinar Toprak. Additionally, she has interned at Hans Zimmer's Remote Control Productions and was a selected participant of the 2016 ASCAP Film Scoring Workshop with Richard Bellis. Dern's most recent releases include The Claus Family 3 (Netflix, 2022) and several Hallmark titles (Love Classified (2022), Presence of Love (2022), Ghosts of Christmas Always (2022), A Heidelberg Holiday (2023), Paging Mr. Darcy (2024)). Her first horror-thriller movie The Devil Conspiracy (Samuel Goldwyn) celebrated its wide theatrical release in January 2023 and is now available for streaming on Hulu. She also re-joined Christopher Lennertz' writing team that same year to contribute music to Disney's Dashing Through The Snow (2023). Dern is currently writing the score for Metro Awakening (2024) by Vertigo Games / Force Field and has been signed on for the Woodwalkers trilogy by Blue Eyes Fiction / Studiocanal. She holds award nominations from the Society of Composers and Lyricists, ASCAP, the International Film Music Critics Association, the Jerry Goldsmith Awards, the Hollywood Music in Media Awards, and the album Women Warriors: Voices of Change which features her music alongside other female composers just recently won a Grammy Award. Dern was also recently welcomed as a new member to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

BIO

Dern was born in Eutin, Germany, and studied at the film scoring academy Musicube in 2007/2008, followed by a Bachelor's degree in Film Scoring at the acclaimed ArtEZ Conservatory (Netherlands) from 2008-2012. The Film Scoring Certificate Program at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) concluded her formal academic studies in 2013.

From early 2013 until late 2014, Dern has been known to work for Cinesamples, developing new virtual instruments as well as updates to existing libraries. Cinesamples' sister company Hollywood Scoring hired Dern in 2014 as a mockup artist and full-time staff composer. As part of the team she worked on productions like Riot Games' League of Legends, Microsoft's HALO V: Guardians, Disney's The Pirate Fairy, FOX's Gracepoint, and many more. A mockup she created for Alan Menken ultimately led to her being brought onto Christopher Lennertz' composer team for both seasons of ABC's medieval comedy musical Galavant. At the same time, she also worked as a temporary orchestrator and technical assistant at William Ross' studio Momentum.

Throughout most of 2015, Dern worked with Pinar Toprak on the Warner Bros. / Skydance production Geostorm, and collaborated with Ryan Shore on his animated Disney series Penn Zero: Part-time Hero and his Universal movie Monsterville: Cabinet of Souls. Later in 2015, Dern also worked as a temporary assistant at Steve Jablonsky's studio Arata Music, lending a hand on The Last Witch Hunter.

After deepening her knowledge during an internship at Hans Zimmer's Remote Control Productions in early 2016, composer Klaus Badelt invited her onto his writing team for the animated movie Leap! (aka Ballerina). While working on several theme park rides with Badelt, Dern was also selected as one of 12 composers for the annual ASCAP Film Scoring Workshop with Richard Bellis.

The following years saw Dern collaborate with a variety of composers and productions while expanding her own studio and career. She worked on several Netflix titles (Fearless, If Anything Happens I Love You, The Claus Family 1-3, Trouble) and frequently scored theatrical productions for the German film studio Blue Eyes Fiction (Help I Shrunk My Parents, Help I Shrunk My Friends, Four Enchanted Sisters, Lilly's Bewitched Christmas). Dern has also repeatedly worked with Hallmark Media (Her Pen Pal, One Summer, Presence of Love, Love Classified, Ghosts of Christmas Always, A Heidelberg Holiday, Paging Mr. Darcy) and scored a variety of indie titles from around the world, such as The Jade Pendant, The Devil Conspiracy, Forever Mine, Captain Black, Allahu Akbar, and more. Additionally, she co-scored several film and video game titles with Klaus Badelt (Legend Of The Demon Cat, Lords Mobile, Galaxy Mobile, Castle Clash), collaborated with British composer Daniel James on a Mongolian play (Legend of the War Horse), and contributed additional arrangements to Warner Bros. Ocean's 8. In late 2022, Dern also started to collaborate with a production company based in China to expand her video game work with titles such as Honor of Kings (Tencent Games) and League of Legends (Riot Games). Throughout 2023, she has been working with the team at Vertigo Games to score their upcoming title Metro Awakening. Additionally, she re-joined Christopher Lennertz' writing team that same year to contribute music to Disney's Dashing Through The Snow. (Click here for a full list of credits.)

Throughout her career, Dern's works have led to several positive nods by critics and have garnered her some coveted award nominations at the ASCAP Awards, the SCL Awards, the Hollywood Music in Media Awards, the Jerry Goldsmith Awards, the Fimucinema Awards, and the IFMCA Awards. Her music was also featured alongside other composers on the album Women Warriors: Voices of Change which won a Grammy Award in 2022.

As part of her initiative to promote the visibility of ethnic and gender minorities in film scoring, Dern was an elected board member of the AWFC from 2019-2021. Additionally, with over 45,000 subscribers, she is the first female composer to establish a successful educational YouTube channel, in an effort to provide visibility and free knowledge to the aspiring composer community. Dern is a member of the performing rights organizations ASCAP and GEMA, and currently holds a seat on the SCL Early Career Committee. She was also recently invited to be a new member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.