Anton Sanko is an acclaimed composer and music producer from New York City, now based in Los Angeles. He has been scoring for film and television since 1991.

Most recently, he scored the hit Amazon Prime Video series Hotel Costiera (2025), which debuted at #1 worldwide for the streamer.

His first film commission came from director Jonathan Demme, whom he met while playing keyboards for Suzanne Vega in the mid-1980s. Demme invited him to score his documentary Cousin Bobby, launching Sanko’s career in film composition.

In 2023, Sanko received his second nomination for the French Academy Award (the César) for his score to Les Passagers de la Nuit, directed by Mikhaël Hers and starring Charlotte Gainsbourg. His first César nomination came in 2019 for Hers’ film Amanda.

He is currently developing several new film and television projects, still chasing that elusive balance between clarity, emotion, and not stating the obvious.

Sanko’s film credits include Rabbit Hole (Academy Award shortlist for Best Original Score), The Half of It, Fractured, The Seagull, Ouija, and The Possession. Earlier works such as Scotland, PA, Party Girl, and Saving Face helped establish his reputation for thoughtful, character-driven scoring.

On the television side, Sanko created music for two episodes of The Romanoffs (by Matthew Weiner) and the series Siren (Disney/Freeform). He was nominated for a News & Documentary Emmy Award in 2017 for E.O. Wilson – Of Ants and Men, and earlier won the same award for the seven-part epic event Great Migrations (National Geographic). He also scored HBO’s Big Love, Amazon Studios’ Alpha House, and served as music consultant on HBO’s Getting On. In 2013, he received a Primetime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Music Composition for the Lifetime Original Movie Ring of Fire.

As a producer and arranger, Sanko arranged Suzanne Vega’s hit song “Luka,” co-wrote on her album Solitude Standing (which received seven Grammy nominations), and produced and co-wrote on Days of Open Hand (Grammy Award winner). He also produced Pools of Mercury (by Jim Carroll), Fantastic Spikes Through Balloon (by Skeleton Key), and albums for Lucy Kaplansky and Anna Domino.