Common Heard Music is a partnership between Common Heard Productions, who specialise in Radio and TV commercial production, and Notepad Music, a successful music writing company.
By combining our resources, we are able to offer our clients a personal, creative, smoother and more streamlined service from the moment of first contact to the minute their commercial goes to air.

Working together enables us to achieve even greater cost effectiveness and we are able to pass the resulting savings on to our clients, delivering fantastic value for money.

Our combined experience helps in every stage of the process, from the first sparks of a creative idea to the final production.

Key People...

RICHARD NEWTON

Richard has written and produced award winning radio commercials for clients as diverse as Volvo, Ringwood Brewery, Heinz and Volkswagen. Before becoming a copywriter and commercial producer he was very involved in the music industry - at one time being a director of a music publishing company that co-published with Warner Brothers Music. He also admits to having a single out on Electra Asylum Records in the 70's that was 'quite big in Bognor'. As Managing Director of Common Heard Productions, Richard works closely with advertising agencies, radio stations and clients throughout the UK.

LIZ RADFORD

Liz is equally at home scoring pieces for an orchestra, or working in the studio with a sampler. As well as writing for Notepad Music, she's travelled the world as a performer (playing keyboards, violin) she’s also written and played in musicals, performed with artists as varied as the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and Boy George! Classically trained, Liz has studied harmony with Bernard Lanskey, Assistant Director of Music at the Guildhall School of Music, London. She’s now writing for television and radio, and enjoys nothing more than a challenge!

GAVIN COURTIE

Turning his music hobby into a career, Gavin played bass guitar working as a freelance player and toured widely across the UK & Europe in the '90's with several artists, including Dove Award winner and Grammy nominated Margaret Becker, Chris Eaton (Janet Jackson, Amy Grant), Brian Kennedy (Van Morrison, Riverdance), Grammy nominee Jessy Dixon. With a keen ear for sounds and an interest in programming, studio work came his way and he started to develop his writing, arranging and engineering skills, culminating in producing records for Alliance Records, Small Dog Records and But! Records. Since 1998 he’s been based in the studio full-time writing music for television and media companies.