One of things that I don't see mentioned or done very often is describe the scene behind a cue and then write a cue and see how it 'compares' to others. Now first keep in mind that any piece of music is 'legitimate' and there is really never a 'right' or 'wrong' answer though as we know, filmmakers and other 'music stakeholders' often have interest and opinions in what the cue should sound like (hence 'spotting sessions') and so sometimes we love our cues but end up rewriting them to be more congruent with the wishes of others.
With that in mind, let's take a pass at the film I am currently scoring. Keeping in mind I will describe the scene here but I will not present my own 'solution' quite yet.
The first three scenes of the film have absolutely no dialog essentially until about 4 minutes into the film. The first scene covering the first 44 seconds are two young people in bed sleeping and morning has come. Than man looks at his phone at a text message and then gets out of bed. The second scene going from about 44 seconds to 1 minute 6 seconds is him out on the porch and then coming into the kitchen.
The third scene is what we will address here. It goes from 1 minute 6 seconds to 3 minute 6 seconds - two whole minutes! He takes out milk from the fridge at the beginning, he starts the Espresso machine grinding beans and then making the coffee and finally he adds the milk and stirs it. For most of those two minutes, all we hear are the sounds of the grinding beans and the hum of the espresso machine.
(Yes, I personally think that 2 minute scene is way too long and I did mention it in a kind way to the filmmaker, but that is what he wants - no changes).
So you have two minutes to score (or not). What exactly would you do? What is your espresso coffee machine music :) ?
This came to mind as soon as you said the Espresso machine- if it's good enough for John Barry...! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBCqP7R42K0
Surely what you do under that scene is a contextual thing. What are we building towards, what's the atmosphere? If it's a spy film, something like the Ipcress File theme works. If it's a horror or thriller, low drone synths will tell us where we're heading, or if it's a rom-com, something lighter like acoustic guitar or a string quartet. It's all about context after all.
fyi - your link is blocked in the US. Keep in mind, at this point in the film I am scoring, the nature of the film is not yet known (it is going to be an LGBT love story). The music can not yet divulge the nature of the film. So the music has to be totally and all about the coffee making process. The purpose of this post, is to give people an opportunity to try out things for themselves and see if it conveys the idea/process of coffee making, whatever that means to them.
Oh sorry, the link was to the opening of The Ipcress File. The whole opening montage is wordless and features Michael Cain making coffee, getting up and so on.
Interesting- why can't the music give us an idea in the opening scenes as to where we're going? Just curious about your process!
Aye, even a coffee brewing scene, if it's the first scene of film, should set the tone for what we're about to see. I scored this Showtime film (https://youtu.be/RlpE09TN-GA) whose first scene was an aerial shot of a police car winding its way through the countryside of Alabama. The producer had an upbeat country song that fit perfectly: generated a lot of energy, which was a good thing. But the film itself was a drama (SPOILERS) that involved some heartbreaking attacks. I composed the main title to fit the sweeping Alabama aerial shot, sure, but there's a heavy dose of sadness included that sets us up for the heartbreak. The country song had the danger of setting up the audience for something lighter and then sucker-punching them with the attacks.
Jonathan - That music certainly works. In fact that is the music that the audience 'expects' to hear when they see a moving scenery or aerial shot. It conveys the feeling of vastness and movement.
Spoiler: Do not read further if you are still thinking about what you would compose yourself for the coffee scene.
So when I was presented with a 2 minute dialogless scene depicting the making of coffee in an Espresso machine, I thought about what sort of music should there be to support the coffee making.
Certainly, one option would be to create music to depict the humming of the machine grinding the coffee beans and flow of the liquid through machine and into the cup.
I decided instead to get my inspiration from music created from commercials to support the product or service being advertised. So I looked up coffee commercials. The more recent ones like Folgers and Starbucks have gone with a more modern pop sound though Starbucks often uses standards and jazz in their stores. I couldn't find any recent commercial reflecting coffee that was congruent with my current 'sound'.
So I went back further. I went back before the Espresso and Cappuccino machines, I went back before the drip coffee makers to the days of the Percolator. Certainly a different type of coffee brewing sound but still coffee. So I checked out the repetitive motifs created for the series of Maxwell House commercials. They are all based on a repetitive 'motif' with a supporting arrangement and instrumentation to match the scenes behind the coffee commercial. (And although not designed to sound like a coffee percolator, there was a Billboard chart hit called "Popcorn" with a similar sound - I guess popping pop corn sounds like coffee in a Percolator! :) )
Here is an excellent video describing how the different arrangements were made (an excellent scoring tutorial by itself):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOBhhLY2aLQ
And I then listened to the various pop tunes I could find that were coffee related - a vast variety. And since I was looking to score based on a vintage coffeemaker, I picked up on the 'latin rhythms' depicted in Frank Sinatra's "Coffee Song" from 1946. And like the Maxwell House commercials, I decided to use "Temple Blocks" as my drip sound and then started my arrangement with Marimba and then moved into strings and the rest of the orchestra. To reduce the monotony, I arranged it in "A B A B C A A" format.
And voila! (keep in mind I am still scoring this film and "Espresso" could change.
http://www.soundcloud.com/joelirwin/espresso
Cool stuff Joel! The C section wouldn't be out of place in a Western!