Katoomba composer Me-Lee Hay has won Best Music for a Short Film for Last Tree Standing, a dark dystopian fairytale at the Screen Music Awards.
Hay’s winning score was for the 30 minute short film directed by Agnes Baginska which is a USA, Polish and Australia co‐production. Baginska has been recognised by Hollywood cult director David Lynch (Twin Peaks, Dune, Mulholland Drive) via a scholarship program and Last Tree Standing is the culmination of this program giving the film a fantastic start in the film festival industry and circuit. It is her first Screen Music Award.
“I am so honoured to win my category,” she told the Gazette.
Baginska also attended the red carpet event to support Hay at this prestigious event. Hay recently returned from Spain's internationally reknowned Sitges Fantasy Film Festival to help promote the film which had also graced the screen earlier in the year at the prestigious Canne Film Festival in France.
The film tells the tale of a young dystopian girl named Lexie, who befriends a peculiar being: half‐man, half‐ tree and is taken on a magical journey of discovery. In addition to double cello performances by former Blackheath resident Rachel Valentine from Australian Opera Ballet Orchestra, the score also features a debut vocal performance by then 11-year-old Mila Van Gennip of Warrimoo whose vocal line actually opens the film.
The Screen Music Awards was staged jointly by APRA AMCOS and the AGSC (Australian Guild of Screen Composers) at the Melbourne Recital Centre last week on Monday November 13.
The event, with 400 film and industry guests attending, celebrates achievements in music composition for documentaries, short films, children’s television, advertising, film and television soundtrack albums, as well as feature films. Comedienne, actor and writer Denise Scott was MC and kept the audience laughing and engaged all night.
Hay's previous credits include composer for SBS One's travel/cooking series Luke Nguyen and astronomy documentaries for Museum Victoria narrated by Geoffrey Rush and Sigrid Thornton. She has done feature film support work for the recently internationally released sci‐fi Australian production “The Osiris Child” (featuring Hollywood star Kellan Lutz from Transformers and Australia's very own Rachel Griffith and Dan Macpherson).