How do you approach writing music in a genre outside your comfort zone?
I've had two such approaches recently, one to score in the style of Randy Newman (which I turned down as I didn't feel able to do a good enough job), and one to score in the style of 80s bands like Madness and Dexy's Midnight Runners (which I'm going to demo for).
My usual method is to become immersed into the style in question and creating a detailed sound pallet in that soundworld, and then to use various existing songs as starting points to explore from. Do other people do this too? And how else do you approach scoring outside your comfort zone?
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I love this idea you've touched on, "creating a sound pallet" - as if choosing your musical "tastes" for a project is the first step on the discovery of a theme or composition. So cool!
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I think that you have the good way to do it, I start by creating the pallet, then I explore that sounds outside the project for a moment, like trying to play with something that is really far away from the project (jamming) to explore the expressions, the limits and the advantages of it, then I comback to the project and design some adjustments then I start the process.
Karen "Kay" Ross oh absolutely, music is just painting with sound, so just like an artist preparing their paints composers need to prepare their chosen sound pallet! (sometimes I call it a soundworld instead, like you're building an audio world for that film)
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Reda Mourah ohhhh the idea of jamming away from the project before starting properly is really interesting. Never tried that. Thanks so much for that insight, I'll definitely be trying that one out!
Joanna Karselis I get turning down projects because they just don't fit. Or the genre is to widely unknown to find examples to get inspired from. Of course the elephant in the room is John Williams. "Give me a score that sounds like John Williams". My reply is: Why not hire John Williams. The only composer that truly sounds like John Williams is himself. So when a client asks me for a score from another Level "A" composer, I either retreat quickly. Or ask to hear the story. Or get a couple of scenes on Quicktime with dialog. So I might send some demos of my styles. And that usually finds a place in the director's heart and mind. It's all about story. Not style necessarily. And the idea of a audio pallet is usually the way I work as well. Sketching sound with stream of conciseness. Just let it flow. And hopefull with a Quicktime .MOV of some scenes to get the feel.
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Jim Rieder I get where you're coming from, and whilst of course we should all sound like ourselves and none of us can truly emulate anyone else completely, I also think there are projects which need to be done in a certain style (for example this 80s project is period dependant, so needs to be done that way).
Also, ultimately the directors we work with are our clients (though often they're collaborators and friends too), so there's definitely an element of needing to include what they'd like in regards to style, instrumentation, etc.
I view it as pulling strands out from what a director is saying/the scores they reference to build a picture of what they'd like, then using my skills and style to re-draw that picture in my own way. That way everyone is happy; I get to write like myself, but the core tenets of what the director wants are respected and accommodated.
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Joanna Karselis Style for sure. The director has in mind the period or style of the score needed for his/her film. Especially if it's a period piece and the score needs to reflect the period of the films' setting. That's a given. Typically, for me, this is the discussion in the first meeting with the director. Then spotting notes to refine the locations of score in the film.
And, of course. Ultimately the director and/or producers have the last word about the composer to use and the score itself.
I do like the director to sometimes use a temp score. Then I hear what he/she is going for in style. Or at least some examples from other films that the director liked the feel of. A recent project for a director in Europe gave me some great insight to the style and feel of the score he wanted for his film. He really identified with Alexandre Desplat's score for Mandela. Which gave me a starting point for at least a stylistic approach to begin sketching some ideas.
And, I will add, that my primary nitch in post audio is sound design, sound editing and mastering digital/analog audio for film and broadcast. I'd like to do more scores. But that's an area I need more training in to be competitive. Without any classical training, there's much to know.