Jack Lenz
John Frederick "Jack" Lenz is a Canadian composer. He has written, performed, and produced music for film, television, and theatre, along with working on non-soundtrack album ventures. He is also the founder of Live Unity Enterprises, an organization devoted to the production of music for the Baháʼí community. Lenz contributed additional music for the John Debney score for Mel Gibson's film "The Passion of the Christ". Among his current projects is working on a movie about the persecution of Baháʼís in Iran, particularly the story of Mona Mahmudnizhad who suffered under the persecution in Iran, under  the title of "Mona's Dream". He was music director of 90 Minutes Live, with Peter Gzowski on CBC Television from 1976 to 1978. He resides in Toronto, Ontario. Background. Lenz was born in Eston, Saskatchewan. His mother was also raised in Saskatchewan, and his father came to Canada from Hungary during the Depression. While still in his youth, Lenz took piano lessons from Garth Beckett and later studied composition at the University of Saskatchewan. Lenz became a professional musician when he played keyboards and flute for the soft-rock bands Seals and Crofts and Loggins and Messina touring around  the world, performing before large audiences, and recording. Lenz' involvement in children's issues stems partly from having seven children of his own, as well as being in an arena which avoids "the conflict between what I believe about music and its sacred nature and dealing with what a lot of programming deals with, which sometimes could be the worst aspects of human nature." Lenz joined the Baháʼí Faith in 1969. Programs. Lenz has done music production work for over 100 programs for various categories of mass media including television series and information/news programming, feature films, movies of the  week, documentaries, live to broadcast, and children's television productions for networks like the CBC, NBC, Fox Broadcasting Company, PAX TV, Discovery Channel, Scholastic-HBO, Showtime, and Nelvana / CBS (as well as theatrical works). Awards. Nominated for several Gemini Awards: Winner of several SOCAN Awards: Artists. Lenz has done production work for Paul Gross, David Keeley, Doug Cameron, Adam Crossley, Holly Stell, The Crawling Kingsnakes and Ava Bowers.