Martin Phipps is one of Britain's leading soundtrack composers, active in both films and television. The first of Phipps' scores to gain widespread notice was that for the 1999 miniseries Eureka Street, depicting the aftermath of the 1994 peace accords in Northern Ireland. Phipps wrote scores for the BBC dramas North & South (2004) and The Virgin Queen (2005); the latter earned him an Ivor Novello Award for Best Original Score. Much of Phipps' energy in the late 2010s and early 2020s was taken up by scores for the six-season series The Crown, about the reign of Queen Elizabeth II; Phipps wrote the soundtracks for the third, fourth, and fifth seasons.