Mark Korven

Mark Korven is a Canadian musician and composer for film and television. His work includes the music on the sci-fi horror cult film Cube (1997), collaborations with director Robert Eggers on the period horror films The Witch (2015) and The Lighthouse (2019), and Scott Derrickson's The Black Phone (2022).

During his early career in Winnipeg, Korven performed in a variety of rock and jazz music ensembles, mostly playing the guitar and singing in local bars. In 1977, he started taking formal music education at the Grant MacEwan Community College in Edmonton where he studied jazz and orchestration. After graduating, he developed into a singer / songwriter and recorded his first album of left-of-center pop entitled "Passengers". In 1987 he moved to Toronto, where he recorded the album "Ordinary Man" with Duke Street Records, and that same year he had his first chance at composing for film, with the score for Patricia Rozema's debut feature I've Heard the Mermaids Singing. which went on to win the La Prix de la Jeunesse at the Cannes Film Festival.

In 1992 he released one more album "This Must Be The Place", although by that time his main activity had become composing scores for film and TV works.

Korven plays several exotic instruments, including the Sarangi, the Nyckelharpa, the Duduk, the Erhu, and the water phone. He was also responsible for the creation of "The Apprehension Engine", a custom made musical instrument intended for the creation of unsettling noises to be used on scoring horror films, built by guitar luthier Tony Duggan-Smith.

During his career, Korven has received several awards, many at the Gemini Awards, Genie Awards and the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival.

Gemini Awards

Philip Strong, Kiran Ahluwalia, Ben Grossman, Ravi Naimpally

Genie Awards

Yorkton Short Film & Video Festival