Was writing music for films a career path that you had decided to follow from an early age, and if so what made you decide this is what I want to do?
I’ve been involved with music from a very early age. My parents sent me to study piano when I was 7 years old but honestly, at that time I couldn’t even think that this could be something I would do for the rest of my life and that would give so much meaning to my existence. My mother always tells me that while going to school, I was always whistling the melodies that we heard on the radio in the morning.
Now, talking specifically about dedicating myself to music for films is something that I discovered much later.
In some way, it was something that was always connected to me and that really influenced me from a very early age but I had no idea that this was something that we can study in a professional way.
Were you from a family background that had musicians?
I am the first member of my family that plays music.
However, my mother is very related to art. She is a very talented painter and sculptor but she does it as a hobby.
I know that she was a key element in my connection to arts in general and specifically music.
What artists would you say have influenced you or inspired you?
Well, I’ve been involved in several and really different kinds of musical genres.
I started playing the electric guitar when I was 15 so I also have a lot of rock influence in myself.
However, in relation to the film music world, I would say that I am mostly influenced by the older generation of composers.
Just to mention some of them, I would say that composers like John Williams, Alan Silvestri, Jerry Goldsmith, James Horner and even the older school of composers like Max Stainer, Henry Mancini or Miklos Rozsa are my main influences. I am sure I am leaving a lot of composers out of this list but these are the main ones that come to my mind right now.
Where did you study music?
I began studying music at the age of 7, starting with piano lessons. As a teenager, I pursued more serious instruction with various private instructors, covering topics such as modern harmony, orchestration, and counterpoint. Additionally, I took courses in Orchestration and Film Scoring at Berklee College of Music, followed by advanced studies in Film Scoring techniques and conducting at UCLA.
However, being completely honest, I think that this is a journey of exploration where you are always learning new skills and improving the ones that you have acquired in the past.
When you are asked to score a project, how many times is ideal for you to see the movie or TV project before you begin to formulate ideas about the style and the placing of the music?
Great question! I think that there is not a right answer for this question. However, I can’t insist enough on the importance of communication throughout the whole scoring process, but mainly before starting writing one single note of music.
There is a process called spotting session where composer and director get together and discuss in details where should be music, where not, what kind of music, when should the music be in foreground and where in the background and a neverending list of things that are crucial in order to achieve the right score that will help to tell the story that the writer/director wants to convey.
So, to reply to your question. When possible, I like to watch the film at least once before starting talking with the director, so I have a general idea about what we are going to talk about.
I don’t think it is a good idea to watch the film several times before having a clear idea what is the story that the director wants to tell and how he/she thinks that music can help to tell that story.
Elma’s Dreams, is a documentary, your score is so beautiful, is there a difference between scoring feature films and documentaries, I mean by this do you approach the assignment differently? And is it also difficult to establish a connection when the film is not a feature film?
Thank you so much John! It really means the world to hear that you like the score so much!
I think that the process is basically the same. We have to keep always in mind that music is there to help the project in any possible way that is needed.
Sometimes, the music just has to support the drama and emotions that are already put on screen while other times the music is so important that the story may not be fully understood if the music is not the right one for that project. And I would like to make a very important distinction here between being great music by itself than being the right music that the project needs.
Sometimes, the music works great to be listenable as absolute music (without being in the context of the film) but it just doesn’t work with the film. On the other hand, sometimes the music can’t survive as absolute music but it works great in the context of the film.
Elma’s Dreams is very thematic, the central theme is utilized in various arrangements throughout the work, do you think it’s important to have established themes for characters and in this case locations also?
Every project has its own challenges and I believe that an important part of the work as a composer is to discover what’s the mission of music inside that specific project.
Specifically in Elma’s Dreams, the main theme describes the deepest emotions that a mother of a fallen soldier can be feeling throughout the whole journey that the documentary describes.
The theme goes through a lot of transformations throughout the story in the same way that Elma’s emotions do. This was an important part of the challenge because it had to be a theme with enough flexibility to be arranged and orchestrated in all those ways.
Also, because Miguel Monforte (the director) wanted to establish Elma’s Dreams as a story of hope, music focused its mission from that specific perspective.
Even though Elma’s Dreams happen in the context of war, we didn’ want to emphasize those flags differences and instead connect the characters from the human perspective instead of the place that they were born.
When you first went to see Elma’s dreams, was there a temp track on the film, or did you watch with no music and discuss with the director in what direction you were going to take with the music?
In this specific project, there was no temp track at all. I am very thankful to Miguel for trusting in my vision from the scratch.
He was very open to my approach to the story as well as the instrumentation that I believe was the right one for this specific story.
We were very lucky to spend long afternoons drinking coffee and having deep conversations about the story that definitely inspired me to go in this direction.
I know you did not conduct the score for Elma’s Dreams, but do you conduct or do you prefer to supervise the recording session from the booth?
This can change from project to project but generally speaking, as long as I have good communication with the conductor, I would say that I prefer to be in the control room.
Even though you can communicate with the orchestra in a more direct way being on the podium with them, since the conductor is mostly every day working with that orchestra, I know that he/she can understand the strengths and weak points and get the best performance from them.
The score for Elma’s Dreams is a short one just under 18 minutes. Is this why there is no CD release at the moment? And if you did decide to do a CD would there be anything else that you would like to see released with it?
Yes, it’s true that 18 minutes can be a little bit short to release a CD Album. We just finished the soundtrack of the documentary An Angel called Rebeca that just has its release throughout all Spain.
We may consider making a release of both but that’s not yet confirmed.
On the other hand, we are currently working on releasing the soundtrack of Halkara that was officially selected for the Oscars 2024 to compete in the best foreign film category.
Depending on the length of this soundtrack, we may consider releasing a CD album too.
We will see since this is still in process..
My thanks to the composer for his time and answering my questions.