projects
Merrick Craven creates music for film, contemporary dance, multimedia, and self-directed projects, including Universal Music Group campaigns and a 45-minute folio for his Bachelor of Music (Hons.). His work spans Melbourne’s experimental and electronic scenes, with folios exploring place as a creative catalyst through orchestral and electronic fusion.
Bachelor of Music (hons.)
The University of Melbourne
Commencing his honours year, Merrick Craven set out to explore Melbourne’s multitude of musical subcultures and transform these discoveries into new creative works. Immersing himself in venues, warehouses, and art spaces across the city, he observed not only the diversity of styles but also recurring patterns in the way communities create, share, and sustain music. In particular, Merrick found echoes of Melbourne’s post-punk “Little Band” scene of the late 1970s and early ’80s — a DIY ethos, fluid membership, and an openness to experimentation that continues to pulse through the city’s underground. Over the year, these insights shaped a series of compositions that draw on both historical resonance and present-day energy. The final folio performance gathers these works into a single event, offering a sonic portrait of a city where the past and present speak to each other through music.
Three Phase
An interdisciplinary performance created by Emily White, exploring the psychosomatic impact of connection on endurance. Featuring four dancers and four live composers, the work blends movement and experimental sound to push both physical and mental limits.
In Three Phase, Merrick Craven collaborated with Lili Wymond, Lachlan Rae and Thomas Fernando to create over 40 minutes of music spanning a wide range of genres, responding directly to the work’s shifting choreographic and emotional landscapes. Recording took place in his Melbourne studio, where he helped produce a distinct set of pieces that evolved from raw noise through pop into experimental EDM, reflecting the work’s shifting energy and textures.
The work was presented over two separate days at the Meat Market, with a total of three shows performed.
Disruptor
Disruptor, created by choreographer David Prakash, pulsed with the defiant energy of street dance, rooted in Hip Hop freestyle and Krump, and fuelled by improvisation, community, and the spirit of protest. Each performance unfolded differently, driven by complex choreographic scores that demanded both individual agency and collective responsiveness.
Merrick Craven’s live score transformed the dancers’ rapid-fire choices into a dynamic sonic landscape, responding in real time to movement and amplifying the work’s raw immediacy. In this high-energy collision of sound and movement, Disruptor invited audiences to step closer, feel the momentum, and experience dance as a living, breathing act of assembly.
It was performed as part of Untethered at The University of Melbourne’s Victorian College of the Arts from 7–10 August 2024.
Universal Music Group
Merrick Lee Craven and his cousin Luke Horton-Crundall won the Splice × Universal Music Group Producer Challenge with their track Serrated, which was subsequently signed and released through Universal Production Music and Bruton Music Ltd. Following this, they spent several years composing music for advertising, producing work across a range of commercial campaigns for UMG.