Born on the Isle of Bute, Scotland, Paul Rissmann is an award-winning composer, presenter, and music educationalist. He studied composition and classical saxophone at the Royal Academy of Music, Guildhall School of Music and Drama and Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.

Frequently commissioned to transform children’s literature into symphonic scores, Paul won a British Composer Award in 2012 and was nominated for an Ivor Novello Composer Award in 2020. ABC Classics (Australia) recorded his interactive musical adventure Stan and Mabel, and his setting of Kobi Yamada’s New York Times bestseller What Do You Do With An Idea? was released in 2023.

Paul’s music has been performed by orchestras all over the world, including the London Symphony Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Philharmonia Orchestra, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, West Australian Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse and Luxembourg Philharmonic.

Recent commissions showcase Paul’s versatility, including a prequel to Stravinsky’s Firebird ballet for the London Philharmonic, a setting of Shaun Tan’s Oscar-winning The Lost Thing for the Adelaide Symphony, and a soundtrack to an animated film about dinosaurs.

Paul is equally comfortable making music in a primary school or unravelling the intricacies of a great symphony for adults. His work in this field has been acclaimed by the Royal Philharmonic Society and Royal Television Society. Paul appeared as creative director in a Channel 4 (UK) documentary Addicts’ Symphony, which explored how music can be therapeutic in overcoming addiction.

Paul curates and performs bespoke concerts that captivate audiences across generations, from full-scale orchestral performances for children to his critically acclaimed series of music discovery concerts Naked Classics. He has guest presented Classics Unwrapped for BBC Radio Scotland, Inside Music for BBC Radio 3 and dissected the world of opera for Glyndebourne in Behind the Curtain.