SCORING ARK-THE ANIMATED SERIES-TALKING TO COMPOSER GARETH COKER.

Did you approach the animated series for ARK differently from scoring the video game. And were you asked to write music that would be in keeping with that of the video game? 

The requirement was to have both an overlap with the game’s music and come up with new material. Fortunately, with the series having a greater emphasis on character development than the game, it left much more room to create a score with contrast to reflect the characters’ various stories. The game score is predominantly focused on action, so as a general rule, we drew from the game for the action music, and created new material for the character scenes. That isn’t to say there isn’t new action music, there is, but it was always built on the aesthetic roots that the game established.

ABBEY ROAD SESSIONS-Photo credits: Benjamin Ealovega.

Some of my favorite moments were discovering the overlaps between the game and the show. Rockwell’s theme, for example, was written for the “Genesis Part Two” expansion. Rockwell is a primary antagonist in the game, and this expansion focused heavily on his back story. We were recording Genesis Part Two at the same time as recording the music for the Pilot episode all the way back in summer 2021, and as a result, I was also writing both at the same time.

Gareth Coker-Photo credits: Benjamin Ealovega.

It was the first time I really realized the power of creative convergence and having themes overlap between two different entertainment mediums. If you listen to a track from the game such as ‘Rockwell Battle Suite’ and compare it to ‘Rockwell’s Theme’ from the TV show, you’ll hear the exact overlap. These two pieces were written within a month of each other.

Gareth Coker-Photo credits: Benjamin Ealovega.

It’s this kind of creative overlap that you can only have when the composer for the show is the same as the composer for the game. It’s multiple years worth of musical and franchise ‘vocabulary’ that I have instantly to hand.

Photo credits: Benjamin Ealovega.

How did you become involved on the animated series? 

I was the only choice from the start. I’d written several hours of music for the franchise at the point the animated series was put into development, and it was felt that the person who knew the game’s musical architecture best should do the series as well. Studio Wildcard – developers of the game – were able to give me the backing and support I needed to get the score done to the best possible level.

(c)Mark Maryanovich

(c)Mark Maryanovich

What size orchestra did you utilize for the score to ARK, as I am told that the producers were keen for the score to be performed by live players, and did you write any sections of the score with a particular soloist or performer in mind?

The producers were indeed keen to get the music produced to the highest level possible. Even at the height of the pandemic they were willing to do whatever it took to get it recorded. I’m forever grateful to them for getting a lot of musicians employed at a time when it would have been an aspect of production that would have been very easy to drop. The first few episodes were recorded socially distanced (all players six feet apart and separate string and brass sections). One of my favorite moments of the entire process was being able to step in to the studio for the first time on Episodes 5 and 6 and actually be with the players who I’d built a rapport with for the first four episodes.

Abbey Road Sessions. Photo credits: Benjamin Ealovega.

The orchestra for the majority of the score had fifty string players, and twenty brass, piano, and harp. All the woodwinds are performed by one player, Kristin Naigus, who has been almost omnipresent across all my soundtracks in the last 6-7 years. I have a few favorite collaborators amongst the London musicians, most notably Philarmonia Principal Trumpet Jason Evans, who has played every single lead trumpet line on the ARK franchise since the first game score recording back in 2017.

The character Helena, has a wonderful theme that is heard throughout, do you think it is important for characters and even locations to have their own individual musical theme? 

It’s imperative for a show like this which is primarily character-driven. Helena’s theme was the first character theme I wrote as she’s the protagonist and it needed to be malleable enough to reflect her character’s transformation. However, all the cast that support her, Mei-Yin, Alasie, John, and the antagonists, Rockwell, Gladiatrix and General Nerva all have themes too. There are a couple of location themes too but the cast are always on the move so a recurring theme for a location is less important in this show. But yes, I love the style of scoring with recognizable themes and variations for multiple characters and wish more shows and games did it!

Gareth Coker- (c)Mark Maryanovich

There are six episodes in the series thus far, when scoring an episodic project do you score each episode in the order that they will air? 

Six episodes in the first half of the series, the second half airs in Q4 this year, so thirteen in total. Yes, I scored them sequentially, it meant that all the themes developed naturally as I went. I honestly can’t imagine scoring it any other way.

The score for the animated series or selections from it have been released on digital platforms, it says volume 1, so does this mean there is more music coming, and maybe a CD release? 

Volume 1 is almost the entirety of the music from episodes 1-6, with almost no cutdowns. The show’s music is – as our showrunner described it – ‘operatic in scope’ so it didn’t feel great to cut it down but also, we wanted any listeners to be able to relive the show through the soundtrack. As the score is so melodic in nature it didn’t feel right to cut anything. Volume 2 will represent the entirety of the amazing episodes. And there are definite conversations about physical releases!

Gareth Coker-(c)Mark Maryanovich

How much music did you write for the series? 

About 7 hours in total!

What is on the horizon for you?

Multiple game scores, and my first major film score, unfortunately all under wraps at the moment, but when the time comes, I’ll be sure to shout about it!

Many thanks to the composer for his time and answering my questions. Also many thanks to Greg O’Connor Read of Top Dollar Promotions, who arranged the interview.

TALKING TO COMPOSER BRUNO VALENTI.

BRUNO VALENTI.

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. 

TALKING TO COMPOSER BLAIR MOWAT.

Blair Mowat is a talented and versatile composer who has penned well over two-hundred scores for film, theatre and television, with clients ranging from The English National Ballet and The Royal Shakespeare Company to the likes of BBC, SKY & ITV.

He is a BAFTA nominated, award-winning composer with over 15-years’ experience, and is consistently in high demand. His work includes Class, an acclaimed 8-part Doctor Who spin-off series on BBC One, ITV’s international hit show McDonald & Dodds and SKY’s The Amazing Mr Blunden.

He composed the score to Russell T Davies’s latest drama Nolly, starring Helena Bonham Carter, for which he was nominated for a BAFTA TV Award in 2024. That collaboration then led on to Men Up, a film Russell exec-produced, airing on BBC1 shortly afterwards. Doctor Jekyll, a new Hammer Horror film starring Eddie Izzard was released theatrically in cinemas in late 2023, with many praising the film’s bold and musical score. Blair also provided the music for Black Dog – which after featuring in BFI’s Cannes GREAT8 Showcase, is set for a theatrical release in 2024 through Vertigo Releasing. Other recent projects include thriller After The Flood, a new six-part show on ITV1 and Britbox from the producers of Happy Valley.

Classically trained from an early age, Blair has a BA (Hons) in Music from Durham University and an MA in Composition for Film and Television from Bristol University. In 2012 he was nominated for a Creative Scotland Award for ‘Best New Talent’ in the Scottish arts. As a musical arranger he has worked on shows including Doctor Who and David Attenborough’s Life Stories. Blair is a full voting member of BAFTA and frequently judges awards such as The Ivors and BIFAs.

McDonald & Dodds and The Amazing Mr Blunden were double-nominated for ‘Best Original TV Score’ and ‘Best Opening Titles’ in the Music & Sound Awards, with Nolly also picking up a nomination for Best Original TV Score in 2023. In early 2024 Nolly won ‘Best Soundtrack’, at the World Entertainment Awards in Los Angeles, securing its reputation as one of the most critically successful TV scores of that year.

BLAIR MOWAT.

How did you become involved with Dr Jekyll?

I had an existing relationship with the director Joe Stephenson. He’d asked on Facebook for a composer recommendation 10 years ago and several people mentioned me so he got in touch and the rest is history! Our first project was The Happy Prince read by Stephen Fry for Sky Arts. When he told me he was doing a new Hammer Horror film I couldn’t resist!

When you first saw the movie did you begin to formulate ideas about the score straight away, or did you watch it a few times before you started to think of the style etc that the music should have?

We first started out talking about a more serious score with greater subtly. However, Joe came to the realisation that the film was working best when it leant in to the bigger bolder stuff – a little self-knowing and fun. That’s when I was given permission to ‘turn things up to 11’ and really go for it! I wanted to take some inspiration from the old Hammer films like spelling out the name in the main theme, but that homage was combined with more modern scoring techniques, so it didn’t just feel like pastiche.

Did the director Joe Stephenson have any specific ideas about what style or sound he wanted for the film, and was the movie temp tracked at all?

Once he knew he wanted something brash and gothic, Joe was the one who was keen on bringing in a choir element  – that was a lot of fun to work with. He definitely wanted it to be orchestral but was never too prescriptive and very open to the idea of using synths and more modern textures too.

What I really love about Joe is he’s very trusting as a director. We spent over 8 hours talking about the film in spotting sessions together at his place in London but after that he really allowed me to go off and discover the themes and sound of the score myself. We did have some temp tracks which was a mixture of stuff he and I had chosen, but the edit was always changing and without a music editor on board the temp was pretty ‘loose’ so I had a lot of freedom.

How much music did you compose for the movie, and is all the score on the soundtrack release?

I’m not sure of the exact number of minutes, but I’d guess around 65 minutes. There are missing cues on the soundtrack release as I felt the album should be as listenable as possible and run together nicely. Some of the more incidental cues didn’t make the cut as they work well in the film but are less engaging for a stand alone listen.

The soundtrack is released on digital platforms, did you compile the music for the release, and will there be a compact disc release at all?

I did indeed compile the soundtrack and in regards to a physical release, I’ve had some interest from companies in releasing a vinyl, which has been my main focus. In regards to a CD release it’s entirely possible but I’ve been too busy recently to have time to consider that – so maybe in the future! It’d be fun to maybe do a CD release with some bonus tracks that didn’t make it on the digital release.

It’s a Hammer production, which is always good to see, were you aware of the Hammer scores for the Gothic horrors such as Dracula and Frankenstein etc, when asked to write the score for Dr. Jekyll?

 I was quite aware of them as I had a wonderful education from Mark Gatiss who lent me his Hammer Horror DVDs when we did a Radio 4 project together called The Unquenchable Thirst of Dracula. That was an unmade Hammer Horror script set in India which was meant to feature Christopher Lee. We did a 90-minute Radio version for it and my music was often inspired by James Bernard’s work for films like Dracula to achieve a more authentic feel for what the film might have sounded like, if it had ever been made. 

It’s a powerful score right from the opening track, and one that contains real thematic properties, which is unusual for horror movies these days, many have drone like soundtracks, it’s a mix of symphonic and choral what size orchestra did you have for the score and where was it recorded?

We had 10 brass players, around 30 strings players, a few wind players and a 30-piece choir. It’s actually on the smaller side of an orchestra though we did double track or overdub the string players to achieve a bigger sound in many places. If we’d had more budget then I think we’d have gone bigger, but I’m still really proud of the final sound. The old Hammer Horror films were often working with a limited budget so it did feel quite appropriate. We used two orchestras; that idea was inspired by the duality of Jekyll and Hyde. IN the end we recorded with both the Budapest Art Orchestra and The Royal Scottish National Orchestra.

Did you conduct the score, or do you prefer to observe and supervise from the control room?

 I was in Los Angeles when writing the score so all the sessions were done remotely from my studio there (sometimes at very painful hours like 3am till 8am!) I do sometimes conduct but these days I prefer to be in the booth and hear what is coming out of the speakers. I do that because that’s what the audience will ultimately hear when the film is released.#

Orchestration is something I like to ask about, do you do your own orchestrations, or is this sometimes not always possible?

Everything is very prescriptively laid out in my projects so all the divisi, over dubs, various string lines etc are there, with modulations indicating dynamics and sometimes notes in the markers. But then when it comes to putting the dots on the page I didn’t have time on this project so I worked with a few orchestrators to get it over the line. I check all the parts and will change dynamics etc and give feedback – I feel that gives me a very similar result to if I were to do it myself. In the end it’s often about speed as there’s never enough time!

What’s next for you another Hammer?

I really enjoyed working on a Hammer Horror project and I’m a big fan of genre filmmaking in general. I was fortunate enough to be nominated for a BAFTA recently for my work on the TV show Nolly, and that’s brought about a lot of interesting discussions – so I’m talking to various directors and producers now about what’s next for me. I’m excited that Hammer Horror are back making films again and I do hope I’m able to do another one in the future as they’re tremendous fun!

TALKING TO THE COLLECTOR.

James Anthony Phillips.

this interview was carried out during covid or just before, unfortunately it was lost into the ether of the internet, but has now been uncovered.

1 Why film music, what is it about music for the movies that attracts you and excites you? 

I was really aware of music in films since childhood. In 1966, Hitchcock’s VERTIGO was first shown on network television in New York and I had a clear view of the family television from my bedroom. At that time, we only had a black & white set with the rabbit ear antenna, so you had to get up and adjust it to get a decent picture. Once the credits came on and I saw the eye with the music haunted me for years. Finally, the restored version came out in colour, and I was shocked because I thought it was filmed in black & white.

Television scores such as The Man from U.N.C.L.E., MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE, and MANNIX along with BATMAN, STAR TREK, and Warner Bros cartoons. Walt Disney animated films and then my life changed when the James Bond craze hit. I nagged my father into taking us to see YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE because of all of the subway posters throughout the system and I’ve been hooked on John Barry ever since. Film music took me to a new time and place and feed my imagination. 

2 What was your first soundtrack and at what age did you buy this?

I picked up Herrman’s score to TAXI DRIVER and OBSESSION right after graduating high school, I had a friend who had the entire album collection of Elmer Bernstein’s Film Music Collection for sale at $5 each, so I bought them. My favorites were Herrmann’s THE GHOST AND MRS MUIR, TORN CURTAIN, Rozsa’s MADAME BOVARY, and the Alex North score VIVA ZAPATA. This was around 1978. In 1979, my aunt gave me Jerry Goldsmith’s STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE album for Christmas and that cemented my collection mania of all things Goldsmith to this day.

3. What’s your opinion of contemporary film music as opposed to film music from the 1960s through to the late 1980s? 

I prefer the orchestral scores of the 1960s, with Goldsmith being the leader and the occasionally Herrmann, but it was really the 1970s that changed the style of films and film scores. However, it was John Williams who without a doubt created the return of the grand orchestral sound with STAR WARS, RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, and SUPERMAN, which to me is the greatest march in film history, even beating out the Alfred Newman from THE CAPTAIN FROM CASTILE. It was the love of these films that led me to the 1930s of the Viennese school composers such as Max Steiner, Korngold, and Franz Waxman. KING KONG, THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD, and THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN can beat out any score from today and Williams fans out there know it.

4 What soundtrack would you release if a record company said to you ok James you can do whatever you want?

 This could be a touchy situation because I had written to several label producers about composers and certain scores, but if I had the rights from Universal, I would do the Gil Melle score to FRANKENSTEIN: THE TRUE STORY, a two-part television film. The film is very haunting, very different from previous Frankenstein scores and composed in the Romantic classical style.

5. Let’s have a desert island scenario, it is just you on an island, but you are allowed 10 soundtracks, what would you choose to take?

This is one of the toughest questions I will have to answer since I love everything that is orchestral and jazz within many genres, so here goes:

1. ALEXANDER NEVSKY – Prokofiev

2. BEN-HUR – Rozsa

3. THE WILD BUNCH – Fielding

4. A TOUCH OF EVIL – Mancini

5. THE WIND AND THE LION – Goldsmith

6. THE OMEGA MAN – Grainer

7. THE GHOST AND MRS MUIR – Herrmann (Dorothy Herrmann, one of his daughters, once told me that her father considered this to be his favorite).

8. THE MISSION – Morricone

9. FIELD OF DREAMS – Horner

10. EL CID – Rozsa

6 before the arrival of CD’S how many soundtracks did you have on LP record?

I had about 800 but lost many of them in a basement flood back in 1996.

7 Do you still play records as well as CDs, and do you do digital at all via music sites such as Spotify and I tunes?

I enjoy listening to records and CDs, as well as ones I have on cassette tapes while I am at home. When I am on the go, it’s Spotify. Great service and very easy. I don’t have Apple products so I no I-Tunes for me.

8 Have you been searching for a score that has remained elusive?

It seems that the labels have been releasing my holy Grails and I have been a happy camper. The most recent example is COLOSSUS: THE FORBIN PROJECT, Michel Colombier’s CITIZEN KANE.

9 what composer or composers would you say dominate your collection?

Without a doubt: Jerry Goldsmith in vinyl and CDs. Next would-be Herrmann, Williams, and Schifrin. I also have a lot of James Horner. I want to praise the late Michael Kamen, with whom I had an email correspondence, and he was kind enough to answer a few of my questions and he also sent me an autographed photo that I have framed on the wall in my bedroom.

10.whats the most that you have paid for a soundtrack and which one was it? 

I bought the hexagonal ANDROMEDA STRAIN album at the old Footlight Records shop in Manhattan for $125. Gil Melle designed the cover and vinyl. When he and his wife Denise came to New York in 2003, was kind enough to inscribe it and now I also have it framed and hanging on my wall.

11 Do you lament the fading out of the main theme or main title music in films nowadays?

YES! One good thing about the Marvel superhero films is that special clip at the end of the credits and you get to hear the full sweep of the score the way the composer intended. I also enjoy the opening fanfares from 20th Century Fox movies.

SCORING IN THE LAND OF SAINTS AND SINNERS.

In conversation with Diego Baldenweg, Nora Baldenweg and Lionel Baldenweg about one of the trio’s recent scores In The Land of Saints and Sinners.

One of your recent projects is In the Land of Saints and Sinners, this is a brilliant score, how did you become involved on the film?

Thank you so much! We got introduced to the director before the film was shot. We had a beautiful chat about movies, life and Clint Eastwood. The only thing we didn‘t really talk about was music. When this film was shaping up and the topic about music arose for the film, Robert Lorenz remembered our talk and suggested asking us to compose music on a script level and to fine tune the music along with the editing process.

The movie is like a modern-day western, kind of like a High Noon scenario, when you first saw the movie did you think of scoring in a similar fashion to a western?

Well as mentioned before we were already attached at a script level so this had a big influence on the music in this film. Eventually the director and us knew that this is a kind of a modern-day Western. Of course, Western music has always been in our bones to some extent and to live up to this style while not drowning in clichés was an exciting yet forbidding task. After having seen the first 30 minutes of the movie, it was also clear that this movie will be a slow burn and that a typical Liam Neeson action music would not do the film justice. We searched for beautiful melodies and themes to create tension on a more emotional level. Once we had the themes sorted out and the Irish inspired harmonies and melodies, we got our dad “Pfuri Baldenweg” to spice up the Western flare by playing the harmonica along with the Irish orchestral music. 

There are two distinct styles within the score the western angle which I think is displayed in tracks such as Lone Ranger, and Death Stare, and the more traditional sounding Irish content, in cues like Over the Ocean and Finbar’s Theme. I understand that did research into the background of Irish music, what was this?

The Western angle didn‘t need much research because it was already in our bones. The Irish content was one that we were not familiar with very much. Investing about a week into research and delving into the history of Irish/Celtic music helped a lot. There are typical harmonies used in Celtic music. Due to the tuning of some instruments like the harp, a lot of it comes from the aeolian scales, also used by the 17th hundred classical harpist composer Turlough O’Carollan. The harp was a symbol of pride and freedom for a long time which got repressed later on for political reasons and if played, punished with a death sentence. Because a lot of Irish people had to flee the Irish music started developing its own fusion sound with the instruments from where they fled to. It was only in the 70‘s when that typical Irish sound started to become popular. Many instruments playing the same melody together to an infectious groove. Often a jig. Once we knew these elements, we searched for ways to use these rules and make it sound like something un-celtic. Merging only parts of these rules together to create something new. For example taking the 6/8 rhythm of a jig and slowing it down so that you barely feel the dance. Yet there is something in its DNA that draws you to Ireland.

There is a lavish and very romantic sound too much of the score, with sweeping themes and haunting Gaelic sounding nuances weaving in and out of the proceedings. Dirk Brosse conducted, what size orchestra and choir did you utilise for the score and what percentage of the music was fashioned via synthetic or electronic elements?

We recorded and mixed at the Galaxy Studios in Belgium. It was a pickup orchestra of Belgian musicians and conductor Dirk Brossé made sure to get the best people on board. We recorded 56 strings, 11 woodwinds, 10 brass, the piano was played by Michelino Bisceglia, the timpani played by Tom Oudertis, the harp played by Karen Peeters and the violin fiddle played by Emile Verstraeten. For the choir we needed Soprano, Alto, Tenor & Bass and engaged 16 members of the Flaams Radiokoor.

At our studio I played all of the stringed instruments like Bass, Guitar, Mandolin and some percussion stuff too.

On top of that we got the perucssionist of the fantastic band „Jungle“ Dominic Whalley to play the percussion on some of our tracks.

On a lot of the percussive instruments and also basses, we used spring reverbs to give it that cool 70’s Western vibe.

Nearly every track has some programmed subtle synths and unobtrusive deep percussion elements to it. We always aim for a modern sound aesthetic on the EQ frequency levels. With today‘s listening habits of deep 808 basses and smooth high end, it is always a balancing act of how far you want to push the gritty sounds versus a polished overall feel. Luckily we were able to work with Benjamin Gut (Gut Audio) a very enthusiastic and engaged sound engineer and mixer with whom we worked very closely to achieve a modern version of nostalgia.

Last but not least we were able to engage the amazing Patricia Sullivan from Bernie Grundman Mastering in Los Angeles who gave our tracks some additional magic.

 Who performed the Harmonica solos on the score?

Our father has played the harmonica his whole life long and I would say he is one of these exceptional talents that can just listen and immediately play along. He is deeply rooted in blues and traditional folk, but he can literally play anything.

He arrived with about 40 different Seydel harmonicas. Bass harps, chromatic harps, blues harps in all keys, some very old broken ones. We literally got him to play all facets of the harmonica. Some rhythmic patterns that would complement the rhythm of the orchestra to an extent of that you suddenly could not tell what the orchestra was and what the harmonica was. At a very early stage he picked up a broken harp by accident, but it was maybe not an accident because we eventually used it effectively in the track “Intruders”. Of course, he also got to play some very beautiful melodies for tracks like “Irish Western Ballad”. Besides this, our dad Pfuri Baldenweg and our mum Marie-Claire Baldenweg who is a great contemporary artist are always involved in our scores by giving us a ton of feedback. They are usually our first judges.

The opening scenes are particularly hard hitting, and have very little dialogue, the music is underneath the action, acting as a commentary, constantly raising the tension levels. Did the director have specific ideas about what style of music he wanted for the movie and where music should be placed?

He said that it‘s a tricky one. He wanted brooding tension, a feel for the 70’s and an Irish vibe. We talked to him about this scene – on a very abstract level – feeling like the rainstorm scene in Psycho. They come from Belfast and after a lot of driving they end up at the destination of their fate. He kind of liked that idea and it gave us the freedom to fully lean in on this scene.

 The score is still to be released, and I understand that you are talking to a label, are you able to let us know when this might be?

It will be globally released (digital) by Sony Music Masterworks. The single is out by March 29 2024. A second single on April 12^th and the full album will be released on April 26 2024.

We unofficially also have a label bringing out a CD soon and the producers are also planning to print a limited edition batch of LP‘s. This is all quite fun!

Will all of the music from the score be released, and do you like to be involved with the selection of the tracks that will be released?

We are deeply involved with the selection of the tracks, and we tend to rearrange the cues to a listenable version outside of the films context.

 I think I heard a cimbalom in the opening of the track Fleeing West, and there are a few Irish instruments employed throughout the score, was it difficult finding musicians who played these?

It‘s actually a mandolin played with a self-made wooden guitar pick that I got from one of my best friends back when we were teenagers. The Irish fiddle player was suggested to us, and we were very happy about what Emile Verstraeten delivered. A very joyous Belgian with a Celtic heart.

The Bodhran percussion was programmed and the mix of the harmonica, played by our dad, the melody lines and with the stringed instruments that I played we have already covered the Irish vibe.

What is next for you?

We are finishing off a documentary with a very different approach of an ambient piano score and we are in the middle of composing for 2 new films.