Background
Born in Southend-on-Sea, Couzens was the son of Vera and William Couzens. His father worked for the Ford Motor Company in engine research, and his grandfather was a department store owner.
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Brian Couzens
Edit ProfileCareer
He founded Chandos Records in 1979. He taught himself the trombone as a youth, performed in dance bands, and did his national service in the Royal Air Force band. Couzens arranged music for Electric and Music Industries and the British Broadcasting Corporation, including work for the latter"s programme Friday Night is Music Night.
His skills at arrangements came to the attention of Ron Goodwin, who hired Couzens to arrange one of his own film scores.
The two subsequently collaborated on cinema scores over a period of about 10 years and over 30 films on scores, including such films as 633 Squadron (1964), Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines (1965) and Where Eagles Dare (1968). During this period, Couzens had founded his publishing house Chandos, which had a particular focus on music for brass bands.
With newly gained experience from his film work, he expanded Chandos into an engineering and recording firm, with a mobile studio. He made Chandos one of the earliest independent record labels to use digital recording technology in the early 1980s.
In 2004, Couzens transferred day-to-day production duties to Ralph Couzens, and took the titles of chairman and senior producer for the label.
Couzens was married twice.
