Well, there you have it. We are going in to final mix this Friday, over at Sharpe Sound. This is very exciting, and although there were some minor hiccups along the way, things have gone smoothly overall and the final result is a score I can be very, very proud of.

So now comes the time to reveal some audio from the film!

Click here to go to the music page and check it out!

It’s late and I am tired, but just wanted to do a quick post before I head off to the land of nod.

Today I wrote the first part of a very intense action sequence and there is something about this cue that is worth noting: it’s very, very intense and it’s not the climax of the movie.

Now, I believe that all action cues in a film should not sound alike and that you should keep some juice in the tank for the big moment, the climax, if you know what I mean.

However, with this scene, I had to be intense. Why? It has to do with the character’s arc and his POV.

In this scene, Silkboy has just arrived in Fantasy Land (that’s the name we give it, but it has no name that I know of) and has just been slapped by a talking flower, smacked and thrown by a bat girl and now is flying through the air pursued by mushrooms trying to kidnap him.

He is confused, panicked and totally not in control of what is happening. The music had to reflect that confusion as well as the action happening.

So the music is fluttering, nervous and panicky, loud and fast, giving a sense of disorientation. It is even a bit scary, but certainly not heroic. That would be wrong for this scene and for that point in the character’s arc.

Later on, as Silkboy gets accustomed to his surroundings and jumps into the action, the music will reflect that.

Now off to bed. The goal is 1′30″ of music tomorrow!

Over the past two days I have been writing the music for the treacherous arrival to Fantasy Land.

By treacherous I don’t mean that the Fantasy Land is treacherous, but rather that the movie itself is hard to score.

In the span of less than two minutes three main characters are introduced, all in a very disjointed style.

The music of course follows that to a certain extent, and changes mood quickly from one shot to the next, very much in the spirit of old Disney shorts while still giving a sense of shape and flow to the images.

I originally thought of writing themes for all three characters, but upon seeing the film it become obvious that there was no time to present anything more than one theme, two at the most.

So two characters, Kego the worm and Anya the bat now share the same theme because in many ways  they shared similar characteristics: goodness and tender relationship with Silkboy.

Lucky the flower gets his own theme because he has a unique character in the film, even though he gets little screen time. It’s a fast, sherzando sort of theme, and we’ll see what I can do with it later!

To show you how crazy this beginning is, film scoring wise, the Kego and Anya gets played scary, comically frenetic and as a lullaby, all in the span of one minute!

But now, seeing it with the music, it’s amazing how much music pulls everything together!

Anyway, back to work. I’m behind schedule, but not by much. The coming scenes should be much easier to score. I knew this arrival in Fantasy Land would be hard.

PS: Q: How many ways can you score someone falling down? A: Lots! (I’m having fun matching the mood of every fall.)

The animation is supposed to arrive any day now. I have spent the time since I completed the  pre-production music studying related scores and classical pieces, writing tons of melodic sketches and also scoring a short film called “Lazy Susan”.

But now that the time is coming to start writing the underscore for ‘The Legend of Silk Boy”, I need to get the final themes chosen. The first one was the main theme, of course.

I woke up yesterday with new ideas in my head and went out for a walk in the park with my homemade music notebook to write them down. (It was sunny and cool, I love weather like that. Today it’s pouring.)

This little writing session added to the 30 pages of melodic sketches I had, mostly of the main theme. It was time to choose from this melodic bounty, and it was not easy.

I chose 15 (!) potential main themes and then proceeded to do little piano mock-ups in Cubase, with string on the melodic line.

Doing this allowed me to just sit back and listen, experience them as a listener. I was not able to do that while playing -  I tend to think everything sucks.

But just listening to them I was very, very happy with all of them!

That is great, it made me feel really good about myself and that my efforts at molding some solid tunes yielded excellent results, tunes I can be proud of.

But that didn’t help me in choosing the ones to send to the director. I can’t very well send him 15!

So Sophie (my wife) came down to my studio to help me with fresh ears. I explained what the mood was and what the requirements were for the tune and away we went.

From the 15 we narrowed it  to 4. Much better.

Now I have other themes to write, but I don’t think it will be so hard. Because this is such an important project for me I really wanted this main them to be world-class, and that pressure made it harder to be objective about it.

That pressure, though, yielded some really good themes! I can’t wait for the orchestra to play them; it’s going to rock in a huge, huge way!

I have a really exciting project coming up (more on that soon), and it will require a grand orchestral score, which is very exciting all by itself.

My current orchestral template has at its core Wallander Instruments (winds and brass) and Synful (strings) and it is simply a dream come true.

Seriously, my template is as close to a real orchestra as I have ever dreamed of having in the digital world. And more! Let me explain.

The Wallander Instruments are amazingly realistic and not based on samples. I play them with a keyboard and breath controller to achieve stunningly realistic results. Arne Wallander has created virtual instruments that respond like the real ones down to the smallest detail, right down to the dynamic range of each instrument. For example, the bassoon plays more softly in the top register than the lower!

This means that all balancing is done through orchestration and dynamics, as would be the case for a real live orchestra. With my template in place, I don’t do any mixing and fix it all in the writing and the playing. (Well, if I have solos, I do mix it in differently.)

Synful’s strings are extremely playable also because they are based on synthesis technology. I control all dynamics through the use of MIDI continuous controller 11 and velocity, achieving almost all the nuances of tone and performance I desire, and again, all is balanced through the use of played dynamics as opposed to mixing.

I could go on, telling you about the fact that I have a single track for each instrument, not needing to load staccato, legato, runs, ensemble or trill samples separately, and if I a play a string chord in Synful, it makes it a realistic divisi right away! Instead I’ll just end with some music.

In order to really get a solid and realistic orchestral template, I have rendered some orchestral classics, namely The Pines of Rome and Petroushka.

You will hear three short excerpts, in each case first is a real orchestra followed by my own synthetic rendition. Everything you hear is done without mixing or major finessing, just live playing of each part, one at a time.

Not bad at all. Oh sure, I can hear the difference – I mean, we can’t replace an orchestra! But I am still amazed by the results!

I am continuing to work on my template and sequencing skills before the big project arrives, and the results will be fantastic!

Add a little here, take away there. As I complete the piece for saxophone and piano, it strikes me (yet again) how much small details make a big difference.

I just added two little empty beats before the closing section, it’s nothing right? Now the whole section feels 100% better, without changing a single note!

And scattering two or three beats in the introductory section was enough to give it a more natural flow.

A bigger change was inserting very short contrasting B sections just before important changes in texture. It creates a better ebb and flow to the piece.

It’s all about balance.

I still have to fix a few more things. I think the ending is too abrupt, and even though I generally like unresolved endings I don’t want to make it feel like the piece was cut off.

I am looking for the perfect form, and I won’t give up until I get it.

It’s going to be one nasty piece! It’s fast, showy and exciting. It has lots of cool textural and melodic ideas, some nice counterpoint, “solo” sections with big funk-meets-Bartok grooves, fast unison runs and even a canon!

I can’t wait to hear it played on October 27th!

Yesterday was a day of assessing the new piece; what to keep, what to change, what to ditch.

I kept the first half pretty much as is and dropped the second half completely. I spent then most of the day working out the details of that first section, the lines, the textures, the counterpoint and the notation.

It was good to do that and not rewrite the end right away, because very often, composition is like problem solving; your unconscious often provides the solution to the problem after some distance and rest.

And that’s what happened, I awoke with the idea for the dénouement (the resolution) and then worked in out in the hot shower. (That’s a mental picture I perhaps don’t want to provide here…)

Anyway, so I then came downstairs to the cave and wrote that ending easily and quickly.

And I think I like it!

Believe it or not, it ends with a C sharp major chord in root position! That I am including a triad in such an exposed and bold manner is a sign of my growing confidence, I think!

But now I need something between the climax and the ending, a little transition that would represent depression, loneliness.

(I will explain what this “depression” business is all about in the next journal entry.)

And that’s a great way to work, knowing exactly what music you are starting from and going to.

Like building a bridge.

Alright. Back to work.

Okay, the piano piece is completely done. I finished the engraving a few days ago and here’s a quick peek and short excerpt from the MIDI sequence.

The title is “Red on Black”.

Now it’s time to send the piece to the pianist, work on the interpretation and talk video with Jeff.

Yeah! Now it’s saxophone time!!!

First Draft Completed!! Hooray!

The piece stands at just over 17 pages, at four systems per page.

I wrote a total of eight pages today, which is good. It just poured out and I have the form all laid out. It just needs some filling in now, that’s all.

I already know I am excited by some of the ideas I had today, but we’ll see how it all holds up tomorrow.

I have doubts… because the original plan of writing a theme-oriented piece fell by the wayside along the way.

I wound up writing a few development sections, bridges, episodes… Oops.

Oh well.

That’s because the theme itself was more of a, open-ended subject, as it turns out. (Open-ended, as in it didn’t cadence, it just kept on going!)

And because it was a subject, it was asking for an invention-like form. Which is fine with me, you have to listen to your material and follow where it leads.