March 31, 2023
The Italian film composer Ennio Morricone has died at the age of 91 on Monday, July 6th, 2020. His Lawyer, Giorgio Assumma, told CNN that he died at dawn in a Rome hospital after falling and breaking his leg. Morricone is best known internationally as the composer behind the melodies from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly and Once Upon a Time in the West. The Oscar-winning composer was […]
Home Before Dark is an Apple TV+ original series based on the real-life events of journalist Hilde Lysiak. The show follows 9-year-old Hilde Lisko (Brooklynn Prince) as she investigates a cold case about a missing child whom was childhood friends with her father. Creators Dana Fox and Dara Resnik trusted composer Nathan Lanier to capture the essence of Hilde through the score to portray a tonal balance of childlike wonder, […]
Composers often toil for years, if not decades, before attaining the coveted status of writing music for motion pictures. Among such modern stalwarts, Hans Zimmer, Alan Silvestri, and, surely, John Williams now hold the foremost status among those who write film scores, but it unquestionably took them considerable time to reach those hallowed positions. Top composers are so in-demand, they might be asked to write multiple film scores in one […]
Though he has been a news producer since 2005, Matt Schrader sought to ‘leap out of that world’ to try something different when he endeavored to create the singular project Score – A Film Music Documentary. While Schrader had seen DVD featurettes about feature film composers, he learned that a full-length movie about the subject had never previously been attempted. As Schrader had no connection whatever to the film composer […]
For Mary Poppins Returns, one of the biggest challenges was making the spoken word smoothly transition into the musical sequences. Once the sound and music editing teams prepared all the dialogue and production tracks, singing pre-records, ADR, hard effects, ambiances, foley and music tracks, the various audio elements had to be combined in a process that makes a grounded, believable soundtrack. That was where re-recording mixers Mike Prestwood Smith and Michael Keller came in. […]
“The overall thing about Spike’s films is an undertone of we are all the same. We are all human beings. We are all Americans. I’m always trying to write themes that speak to that idea. That is one of the reasons we use orchestra as much as we can,” shared composer Terrance Blanchard who has worked with director Spike Lee since the beginning of both their filmmaking careers. He felt he has grown as an artist along with the director. […]
Composer Brian Tyler’s first impression of Crazy Rich Asians was that of a modern romantic comedy set in contemporary Singapore. However, after seeing the footage shot by director Jon Chu, he realized the story felt and looked much bigger. “The film was more of an old school Hollywood romance with social underpinnings and themes about family and who we are,” said Tyler. […]
If you bet on every favorite in your office’s Oscar pool this year, you did quite well. It was a year of very few surprises, and stood in stark contrast to last year’s “wow finish” –to borrow a line from the movies. And yet those who won were very thoughtful about their craft–both above and below the line, especially when they were allowed to ruminate at greater length, backstage, […]
Written for the movie Marshall, the genesis of the Diane Warren and Common collaboration, Stand Up for Something, began with two lines that “just popped” into Warren’s head: “It all means nothing, if you don’t stand up for something.” “It’s so simple, but it’s profound, because it’s really the truth,” stated Warren. “If you can really write that. If you can make that into a song…” Warren wanted a […]
From the Coen Bros. to Charlie Kaufman and now Martin McDonagh, Carter Burwell is known for his unique sensibility and flawless scores. In the spirit of his generosity of self this busy Awards Season, Below the Line presents an uncut Q & A session with the master Composer and lets the love flow. Below the Line: When you start out on a film do you first create an aural template/overall […]