Film Scoring: Composing For ‘The Jump Scare’

As a Composer for films you will encounter many common cinematic devices that require an almost formulaic musical response. One such example of this is the ‘jump scare’. We’ve all seen this used probably hundreds of times, yet its effectiveness often relies heavily upon the music.

Your job as the Composer in this situation is to make the audience premeditate what’s about to happen, without giving too much away. It’s the musical setup leading to the expectation of the event i.e. the scare.

Keeping this in mind, there are several important factors that you should be aware of when composing for this type of scene.
… Continue Reading

Posted in Blog

The Importance Of Getting Your Music Played

As a composer there is nothing more important and fulfilling than seeing your compositions come to life in the way you intended them.

Unfortunately it has always been tremendously difficult to find such opportunities to have your music played, especially if you are writing orchestral music.

These days with the rapid advancement of music technology it is even becoming common practice in Hollywood to opt out of using live players and instead sequence the whole project in order to dramatically cut costs. Many big film scores including the Batman trilogy have mixed live orchestral tracks with midi instruments to create a huge ‘epic’ sound that is so desired in film composition (at the moment).

… Continue Reading

Posted in Blog

Precautionary Measures When Writing For Strings

Since it is widely recognized that the string section is the backbone of the orchestra, it is therefore fundamental that composers of all breeds understand how to write effectively for them.

Putting all theoretical knowledge of composition aside, I am mainly concerned with addressing the physical and sonic limitations of these instruments in terms of writing coherent music that will sound good and keep your players happy.

… Continue Reading

Posted in Blog