Murray Neville Thom (born 19 July 1957) is a New Zealand businessman and music producer. He is best known for his collaboration with pianist

Carl Doy Carl William Doy (born 1947) is a British-born New Zealand pianist, composer and arranger. One of New Zealand's most successful musicians, Doy is probably best known for his multi-platinum selling ''Piano By Candlelight'' albums. Life and care ...

, which resulted in their Together 10-CD collection being featured as one of

Oprah's Favorite Things "Oprah's Favorite Things" was an annual segment that appeared on ''The Oprah Winfrey Show'' from the 1990s to 2008 and 2010, as well as on ''Rachael Ray'' in 2017. In the segment, which airs during Thanksgiving week and was inspired by the holiday ...

of 2002. Locally, his production company, Thom Productions is best known for the 12× platinum Great New Zealand Songbook and The Great New Zealand Cookbook, which have also been released in numerous versions for other countries.

Career

Music

Thom joined CBS Records International as a sales representative in 1979. He was appointed managing director of CBS in 1981, at that time the youngest CBS managing director in the world. Thom left the corporate life to establish his own business in 1986. He signed New Zealand recording artist

Dave Dobbyn Sir David Joseph Dobbyn (born 3 January 1957) is a New Zealand musician, singer–songwriter and record producer. In his early career he was a member of the rock group Th' Dudes and was the main creative force in pop band DD Smash. Since then h ...

who had featured on the ''Footrot Flats'' album and together they produced the '' Loyal'' album. Thom discovered pianist

playing in the lobby of an Auckland hotel in 1987 and together they produced their first album '' Piano By Candlelight'' in 1987. They have produced a number of recordings specifically for China. In the US, the Together collaboration with Doy was packaged into a 10 CD and book collection, which Oprah featured on her show as one of

of 2002. In 1996 after seeing Rob Guest performing in the leading role of Jean Valjean in ''

Les Misérables ''Les Misérables'' (, ) is a 19th-century French literature, French Epic (genre), epic historical fiction, historical novel by Victor Hugo, first published on 31 March 1862, that is considered one of the greatest novels of the 19th century. '' ...

'', Thom signed Guest to a recording contract. Guest's album '' Unmasked'' was released in 1997 by Thom. Thom was the creator and executive producer of ''The Great New Zealand Songbook'' released in 2009. The album went on to become certified 12× platinum. Thom followed up with ''The Great Australian Songbook'' released in 2011. Thom collaborated with

Neil Finn Neil Mullane Finn (born 27 May 1958) is a New Zealand singer-songwriter and musician. He is best known for being a principal member of Split Enz and for being the lead singer of Crowded House. He was also a member of Fleetwood Mac from 2018 ...

to re-record the war song " Blue Smoke", which was released on Anzac Day 2015, with proceeds going to the Returned Services Association. In 2019 Thom and Tim Harper produced The Offering Project, which was a collaboration between twelve New Zealand recording artists and twelve of New Zealand visual artists. The concept was to record well known gospel hymns that were also interpreted by visual artists, with all the proceeds going to the work of the Salvation Army in New Zealand.

Books

Following the release of ''The Great Australian Songbook'', Thom produced ''The Great New Zealand Cookbook'' – instead of 40 recording artists writing their lyrics, this was 80 cooks, chefs and bakers handwriting their recipes. The book won the 2015 Gourmand World Cookbook award for ‘Best Easy Recipes’. Further publications were produced including ''The Great Australian Cookbook'' (2016), ''The Great South African Cookbook'' (2016), ''The Really Quite Good British Cookbook'' (2017), with front cover art by Sir Peter Blake, and ''America The Great Cookbook'' (2017). Thom released his memoir ''Eat, Drink & Be Murray'' in 2019.

Personal life

Thom's hobby is sailing and in 2005 won the World Laser Master Championships in Fortaleza, Brazil.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Thom, Murray Living people 1957 births New Zealand record producers New Zealand businesspeople New Zealand writers