Sam Hirschfelder

Sam Hirschfelder is an Australian award-nominated composer and multi-instrumentalist based in Los Angeles, celebrated for his distinctively off-kilter approach to comedy and drama composition. Drawing on an unorthodox and colorful musical palette, Sam brings to his scores the sensibility of a gifted whistler, pianist, synthesist, drummer and percussionist — a combination that gives his work an eccentric warmth and chamberesque intimacy that is entirely his own.

His credits span a broad and impressive range of screen work, including The Fabulous Four starring Susan Sarandon and Bette Midler, Netflix/Peacock series Irreverent, for which he was nominated for an APRA AMCOS screen music award, Indie feature What We Found, Slamdance-selected documentary Markie in Milwaukee, Chinese epic The Whistleblower, HBO animated series Infinity Train, multi award winning short Keloid, horror feature Rising Wolf, documentary feature Seed, family feature Dance Academy, and most recently the 2025 MIFF selected feature documentary Not Only Fred Dagg But Also John Clarke, as well as many other projects across TV, film and advertising. Sam is a frequent collaborator with his multi-award winning composer father David Hirschfelder, Los Angeles composer Morgan Z Whirledge, and VMA award-winning director and photographer Anthony Pham. Sam also serves high fashion giant AMIRI in multiple capacities — as composer, music supervisor, music consultant and mix engineer.

Sam holds degrees in both Music Performance and Law from Monash University, and has pursued additional studies in Music at NYU and International Law at Leiden University. That breadth of formal training is reflected in the range of roles he occupies across the industry: beyond the composer’s chair, he has musical directed and performed at some of the world’s biggest international music festivals and on major late-night television programmes across the United States and Europe. Sam also co-founded Forager Records and Foraged Sounds, a Los Angeles-based reissue label and publishing entity dedicated to championing rare and under-appreciated sounds from the past.

Utilising his fluency in both the creative and administrative dimensions of the music industry, Sam has acted as personal manager to double Grammy-winning artist Kimbra and acclaimed electronic duo Purity Ring.

While in Cairo during the 2011 Egyptian Revolution, Sam documented police brutality against protesters and civilians, footage later aired on Arabic news. While a little less adventurous in his off time these days, Sam can be found reading widely across science and psychology, spending time with his young daughter, and obsessively adding to his meticulously maintained map of 300+ Los Angeles area restaurants — which he is always happy to share. Sam holds dual US-Australian citizenship.