Clef NotesScoringSessions.com
 An interview series with leading Motion Picture & Television Industry Composers 
Film & Television Composers score music to accompany a motion picture for film or television. This could include dramatic underscore as well as popular songwriting. The traditional role of a film composer is to provide the orchestral dramatic underscore, and only more recently has the popular soundtrack begun to stand on its own.
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Pictured (Under): "The Wrecking Crew"

Don Davis | Composer *

Don Davis: Revisiting The Matrix

You recently worked on the score to "The Matrix Reloaded", and used similar material from "The Matrix". Tell me a bit about the elements you used to create this score.

Well, the Wachowski Brothers None of us were interested in abandoning what had been established in the first picture; we wanted to expand on it, just like the Wachowskis expanded on their palette. So I was definitely looking to see how I could take those motifs and post-modern concepts and pursue something bigger and more ambitious.

Clef Notes
Fri, 11/10/2017 - 08:17
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Roddy Bottum | Composer/Musician

Getting to Know Roddy Bottum

Coming from two successful rock groups (Faith No More and Imperial Teen), how did you make the jump into film music?

I grew up in Los Angeles, and was always into film music as a kid. I moved to San Francisco to attend the film program at San Francisco State to learn film production. San Francisco in the 1980s was a thriving art community - so it made sense to work in a lot of different fields - so I joined a band. The band took me on the road - away from the camera, and the area where I could make films. It ended up being a fulltime job for many years. So I just stopped doing film for a long time while I was touring, since Faith No More turned into a round-the-clock, throughout-the-year, fulltime job. Now, after about 15-years, it makes sense. Since I want to stay home and not do as much touring, I can get back into film.

Clef Notes
Mon, 08/21/2017 - 08:02
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Tyler Bates | Composer

Get Tyler: An Interview with Tyler Bates

By working on "Get Carter" you had an opportunity to take a recognizable and respected theme and re-approach it. How was it to take someone else's work and mold it to be your own?

I enjoyed it because I liked Budd's original score which I think is an interesting work of music in and of itself. He wrote the score nearly 30 years ago and recorded the entire bit for a meager 400 pounds. This includes songs, vocalists and an eclectic cast of musicians. I have a great deal of respect for any artist who doesn’t allow money to govern the extent of how far they will go to achieve the ultimate end results. I thought the opportunity to arrange Roy Budd’s theme for the year 2000 was great fun. Additionally, the visual style of the film lent itself to many interesting sonic possibilites, so I was able to incorporate a lot of unique elements into the piece as well as changing the melody instrument. Budd originally played it on a harpsichord. I used a marxophone to give it a different sound. The director and I talked about acquiring the rights to rearrange and re-orchestrate the original Budd theme early on in the project. I had yet to have the opportunity to do a project like that, so I seized it!

Clef Notes
Sun, 05/21/2017 - 08:06
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John Barry | Composer

John Barry: The Gstaad Memorandum

Why was this film [Moviola, a documentary on Barry, which was screened moments before] made, and why does it not deal with the diversity and versatility of your music?

There's a very simple answer. This was made by Sony. I'm with Epic Records, and I made an album called Moviola. That album was a compilation of all the romantic themes, or many of the romantic themes, that I've written. And when you listen to an album, I think it's nice to have a transcendent mood rather than a romantic one. So it had a similar tone throughout. It was made by Sony, then it was picked up by Channel 13 in America, and put on a series they had called Great Performances. So that is why it is of this nature. I've also done another album for Sony called Moviola II, which takes care of all the James Bond music, Zulu, all the action films that I've done.

Clef Notes
Mon, 04/17/2017 - 06:58
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