About

Ashton Gleckman is a filmmaker and composer from Indianapolis, Indiana. Dubbed a "Wunderkind" by The Hollywood Reporter, Ashton blends his passions for music and storytelling across feature documentaries, television series, YouTube content, and solo music releases. His work, including his Behind the Score series, has garnered recognition from figures such as composer Hans Zimmer and film directors like Guillermo Del Toro.

Ashton’s directorial debut, We Shall Not Die Now (2019), explores the Holocaust through interviews filmed across the U.S., U.K., and Poland. The film premiered at the Heartland International Film Festival, winning the Audience Choice Award. He followed with I Am The Last Surviving Prosecutor of the Nuremberg Trials, a short film about Nuremberg prosecutor, Benjamin Ferencz. The short film was shown in front of the United Nations General Assembly in New York City by Ukrainian ambassador, Serhii Kyslytsia, following the Russian Invasion of Ukraine in 2022. He followed with The Hills I Call Home (2021), an intimate portrait of small-town Appalachia, released by Gravitas Ventures.

In 2023, Ashton directed Kennedy, an eight-part documentary series for The HISTORY® Channel. Featuring over 70 interviews he filmed with historians and public figures, including Conan O’Brien, the series was narrated by Emmy Award-winner Peter Coyote and praised by The Los Angeles Times as “fresh and exhaustive.” Ashton served as director, editor, and co-composer, collaborating with Michael Frankenberger and Cameron Moody on the musical score. The series was released on Hulu.

He recently directed The Quiet Village, a documentary about the first Nazi extermination camp in occupied Poland. Filming took place between May 2024 and February 2025 across Poland, Germany, the U.S., Canada, and the U.K. The film is narrated by Liev Schreiber (Defiance, Spotlight), co-produced by the Academy Award-winning RadicalMedia, and is slated for an early 2027 premiere. Learn more about The Quiet Village.

Before pursuing filmmaking and composition, Ashton performed as a rock musician and songwriter, recording his debut EP at Dark Horse Institute in Franklin, Tennessee. At 15, he composed the music for the documentary Once Upon a Family. Since then, he has released eight albums, including Fragments and Winds of Spring, as well as two volumes of A Night at the Movies, a collection of original film music arrangements. His original compositions have been featured in productions like Netflix’s WWII: The Road to Victory and Disney+’s Avatar: The Deep Dive.

Since 2016, Ashton has hosted the YouTube series Behind the Score, where he reconstructs iconic film scores and recreates them using virtual instruments. Episodes have covered films including Interstellar, Inception, Oppenheimer, and The Shape of Water. His arrangement of Hans Zimmer’s Interstellar score has surpassed 18 million views, and Guillermo Del Toro shared Ashton’s The Shape of Water episode on social media. In December 2021, Ashton’s rendition of Danny Elfman’s Ice Dance reached #1 on the social media platform TikTok, amassing over 400,000 track uses.

For his YouTube channel, Ashton has also interviewed composers including Harry Gregson-Williams (The Chronicles of Narnia), Simon Franglen (Avatar: Fire and Ash), Nathan Johnson (Knives Out), and Justin Hurwitz (La La Land).

As Ashton continues his creative journey, he remains dedicated to telling meaningful stories that resonate with audiences, embracing new challenges and exploring new worlds as both a filmmaker and composer.