Craig Dobbin

Craig Dobbin is an acclaimed composer with more than 30 years of professional musical composition in film, television and commercials. Since 2016, the two-time BMI award winner has composed the score for the top-rated primetime weekly CBS series NCIS Los Angeles and has been crating music for Discovery Channel Shark Week since 1991.

He began his love for music at the age of 7, while studying the piano. By age 14, Dobbin was mastering Contemporary Jazz Theory and Classical Composition. While still an undergraduate at UC Santa Barbara, Dobbin composed the music for two films and a variety of television commercials. Before being named Outstanding Senior and graduating with a B.M. in Composition in 1990, Dobbin had also recorded his first solo album for D&D records.

Since then, Dobbin has composed music for a wide variety of genres, from the popular PBS shows, Jay Jay the Jet Plane and Betsy’s Kindergarten Adventures to the world-renowned Discovery Channel Shark Week, which he has been scoring episodes for since 1991. With such a wide range and depth, his compositions have also been featured in commercials for such major clients as Samsung, Visa, McDonalds, Mobile Strike, Netflix, Marvel, Exxon, State Farm, among many more. Recently, Dobbin created music for the feature-length public television documentaries Searching for Home: Coming Back from War and unMASKing HOPE.

In 1993, Dobbin, along with William Aura and Alain Eskinasi formed the contemporary jazz group 3RD FORCE. Their first CD on Higher Octave went to #9 at Radio, their second and third, Force of Nature and Vital Force, both shot to #3, and their fourth CD, Force Field, hit #2. Their 8th Album, Global Force, released in 2016 after a 10-year hiatus, hit the coveted #1 Billboard spot.

With NCIS Los Angeles coming to an end after 14 seasons in May 2023, Dobbin is set to begin work on a new feature film, The Tasting, scheduled to begin shooting in late 2023.