Jed Danyel Kurzel (born 1976) is an Australian singer-songwriter-guitarist and film composer. He is a founding member of The Mess Hall (from 2001), a blues rock duo. His older brother Justin Kurzel is a film director and screenwriter.
Kurzel was born in c.1976 and, with his older brother Justin Kurzel (born c.1974), grew up in Gawler, South Australia.[1][2] Their father, Zdzislaw Kurzel (1946–2006), was from Poland and had migrated to Australia in 1960, where he became a taxi driver.[3][4][5] In the 1990s, Kurzel moved to Sydney, where Justin was studying at the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA).[2]
In 2001 Kurzel on lead vocals and guitar, Anthony Johnsen on drums and a bass guitarist formed a blues-rock group, the Mess Hall in Sydney – the bass guitarist soon left but was not replaced, they continued as a duo.[6] Kurzel recalled "When the clubs asked us where our bass player was, we used to lie and say he was sick."[6] Their debut album The Mess Hall was released in June 2003. In early 2004 Johnsen was replaced by Cec Condon on drums and vocals.[7] Their third album Devils Elbow (October 2007) won the Australian Music Prize.[8]
In 2000 Kurzel composed the film score for the short subject, Sammy Blue, at the Australian Film, Television and Radio School, with Kim Farrant directing.[9][10] He worked for Farrant again: providing the score for Naked on the Inside (2006), a feature film documentary on body image.[10] In 2009 he composed music for Castor & Pollux, a short film, directed by Ben Briand.[11]
^ ab"Naked on the Inside"(PDF). Compétition Longs Métrages Documentaires (in French). International Festival of Films de Femmes de Créteil. 2008. p. 41. Archived from the original(PDF) on 7 April 2016. Retrieved 25 March 2016.