Dave Porter is a Los Angeles based composer for film and television. He began his classical musical training on the piano at age five, but as a teen his interest was in electronic music which led him to start composing his own music. He studied both classical and electronic music composition at Sarah Lawrence College under John Yannelli and started his professional career as an assistant in Philip Glass’ recording studio in New York City.
Dave is perhaps best known for his enduring creative relationship with one of Hollywood’s most respected figures – Vince Gilligan. Since the remarkable pilot episode of Breaking Bad in 2007, Dave has written the original music for all of Gilligan’s projects. He scored all 62 episodes of that groundbreaking series and created its iconic opening theme. Actor/Producer Bryan Cranston stated that “with his music, Dave Porter has created another character for Breaking Bad,” “evocative and meaningful, Dave’s work is an essential part of the storytelling.” Since then, Dave has also been behind all of the original music for Breaking Bad’s equally acclaimed spin-off series Better Call Saul, which just finished its penultimate 5th season. In 2019, Dave revisited the Breaking Bad universe by composing the original score to Gilligan’s feature length film El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie which appeared in theaters and on Netflix.
In the past few years Dave has also worked with James Franco on his masterful film The Disaster Artist, for which Franco was awarded a Golden Globe. Dave completed his 7th season of James Spader’s worldwide hit television drama The Blacklist and wrapped the 4th and final season of AMC’s boundary-defying series Preacher — produced by Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg and Sam Catlin. He also wrapped the 2020 Starz drama series Hightown, from creator Rebecca Cutter and Bruckheimer TV.
Dave has twice been awarded ASCAP’s Composer’s Choice Award for Best Television Composer — at the inaugural event for the award in 2013, and once again in 2017. As well as being an honorary nominee for Best Television composer at the World Soundtrack Awards in 2017. Dave was also bestowed the 2019 Citation Award by his alma mater Sarah Lawrence College for his creative achievements.