A native of Los Angeles,  composer Karen Martin studied classical piano and orchestration in London, subsequently performing her compositions in concert in England, Austria and Italy.  

She returned to Los Angeles, receiving an MFA in Music at CalArts where she was mentored by the founder of their Music program and Pulitzer Prize winner Mel Powell.  

Karen was invited to the Sundance Composers Lab and is a Sundance Fellow. 

She has scored independent films which have screened on Showtime and SyFy Channel, one of which won the Best Science Fiction/Fantasy Film Award at Comic-Con.  Two of the scores were finalist at the Moondance film competition.

One of her most recent films "Charlie and the Hunt", screened at Cannes Film Festival Emerging Filmmaker Showcase and screened at the Slamdance Film Festival.   Karen will be scoring an upcoming Sci-fi film by a writer/director and semi-finalist of the Nicholl Fellowships.

Her stage work includes scoring "The Birthday Present 2050" directed by Jonathan Sanger (The Producers, Elephant Man, Vanilla Sky, Marshall), composing and producing multimedia productions at the Los Angeles Theatre Center and the Odyssey Theatre.

Karen is a member of director Ava DuVernay's ARRAY Crew.