Biography
Allan Gray, also credited as Josef Zmigrod, Alan Gray and Allan Grey, was a composer of film scores. Born Józef Żmigrod in Tarnów, then in Austria-Hungary and now in Poland, he studied in Heidelberg and Berlin, where he worked under Arnold Schoenberg and composed for cabaret and theatre, including productions by Max Reinhardt. He began writing film scores in Germany before leaving the country in the 1930s and settling in Britain.
In the United Kingdom he composed for London Films and other studios. From 1943 he worked extensively with the Archers (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger), scoring The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), A Canterbury Tale (1944), I Know Where I'm Going! (1945) and A Matter of Life and Death (1946). His other notable scores include The African Queen (1952). He continued composing for film, stage and television until the mid-1950s and died in Amersham, Buckinghamshire, in 1973.
