Chris: 0:00

I think this is a perfect topic, because composers are dealing with not just being able to write something that sounds good, but that fits with a story that's already there, and trying to evoke, you know, the emotion or or amplify the emotion that the story is.

Brandon: 0:27

Hello and welcome to the Cup of Tea Critiques Podcast. I'm your host, Brandon Chaisson, and like always, I'll be joined today by the great team that brings you cupofteacritiques.com. We are excited to get started on our podcast where we will share our perspectives on several areas in movies and television. At Cup of Tea Critiques, we review movie and television series and tag them with a tea brew that evokes a feel for the production. In this way you can decide for yourself if they're your "cup of tea." Here on the Cup of Tea Critiques Podcast, we will dive even deeper into the productions and topics we broach on our website, engaging in conversation and sharing our unique perspectives. Ready for a deep look with the deep brew? This week's topic, music and film. So let's get started. Cup of Tea Critiques is a family business, and I'm here with my brother Chris, my mother, Reba, and my father, Terry. And as we get started today, Mom, you wrote a new article that you can find on our website, at cupofteacritiques.com, go to the Crumpets section, and this one was about music and in film. And what I really enjoyed about this, and I want you to speak more on, is you're a sociologist, and what I loved about this piece was I got that perspective from a sociologist, but you also mixed in a lot of personal. So, can you take us through the process of writing this article, and just like just the journey it took you on?

Reba: 1:44

Sure. So as you all know, I love music, which is really kind of a silly statement, because I have yet to meet anyone who doesn't love music, but I love music very much. As, you guys know, I've aspired to play guitar and piano since I was about nine years old, and unfortunately, I'm just, anyway, my brain is kind of square, so I've never become the musician I've aspired to be, but I'm okay. But I have enjoyed watching you and Chris develop as musicians. You guys are really good. I am awe inspired by people who play music well. So when we decided maybe a couple of months ago that we wanted to explore film and music, I jumped at the chance. And for the last several weeks, I've gone down this rabbit hole to learn about musicians and basically how their brains work. And I have really enjoyed this journey. And so I've looked at documentaries, I've looked at sites written by music historians, I've just looked at some of everything you can imagine that I've been able to find on the Web, and it's been fun, And I can continue to do that. But as I said in the article, I have a deadline to meet. And so I want to just, I want to just point out that film didn't always have music. We began with silent films, you know, back in the late 19th century, and so people would come to the theaters to just watch movies with no music. After some time, Wurlitzer organs were brought into the theaters, and musicians would play those organs to the to the movies. And, you know, if there was a fast scene going on in the movie, like a fast train or something, then of course, they would play the organs fast. If there was, you know, a couple of people walking down the street, they would play the organ slow. It would be that kind of thing. Eventually it became pretty traditional, where these same music sheets were distributed to theaters across the country, and if it was a train scene, they would all be playing the same train music. If it was a lover scene, they'd be playing the same kind of music. And so it was that kind of thing. And so anyway, the film industry had a eureka moment. What if we could integrate this music into the film, and so they began composing music took around what was happening in the scene.

Brandon: 4:27

It's interesting because we are very far removed from when music first started getting integrated into film, so it's hard for me to imagine any film without having some sort of musical score attached to it. It's always influenced how much I've enjoyed a particular piece. But it's not even just a specific score to me. I think about those specific moments where the music absolutely influenced my enjoyment of

Excerpt from The Batman: 4:56

Theme from The Batman particular scenes, I think back to say, like in. The Batman, which is Michael Giacchino, there's the scene where the Batman is chasing The Penguin.

Brandon: 5:28

And what I loved was, first, the silence you're dealing with, the fight that's going on before the actual car chase scene. But I absolutely felt myself watching this, and I was sucked into the action initially, but his music had me like, I can tell you, every time I watch that scene, I'm sliding further and further to the edge of my seat in anticipation of what's supposed to come next. And I recently rewatched this scene too and in preparation for for this podcast, and I realized that he actually did something I didn't even think about at the moment. He had me afraid of The Batman who's supposed to be the superhero of the film, and he did a good job of letting me understand the fear that even The Penguin felt during that time. So I say all that to say that that's one thing about musical scores that really, I, we have to make sure we give them a shout out, all these composers, because they do a great job of making us actually feel much more just the action we're seeing on the screen. We get to actually feel it even more inside of ourselves.

Reba: 6:25

Yeah, someone who's credited for a lot of that is Bernard Herrmann, and he, for example, scored Psycho. He scored Citizen Kane, North by Northwest, Cape Fear, the original Cape Fear. He scored a film called Sisters. And Bernard Herrmann worked very closely with Alfred Hitchcock, and he and Alfred Hitchcock were essentially partners. He scored a lot of films with him. The reason he's given so much credit is because he just brought so much emotion to the screen with his music, and he is considered the first person to actually begin doing something like that. There's a documentary, for

Excerpt from Psycho: 7:00

Music from driving scene in Psycho example, that talks specifically about what he did in Psycho. There's a scene where Janet Leigh is driving her car. She had stolen money in her car, or something like that, and there's a police car driving behind her, and then there's a scene with

Reba: 7:18

And so this guy that was talking about the scene was the road in front of her. And there's no music to it at this point. And so when you look at that scene, that's all it is, just this woman driving this car, road in front of her and police car driving behind her. And so Bernard Herrmann said, you know, there's nothing to that scene. But remember what Psycho was, you know, it was an intense film. Bernard Herrmann wanted the audience to feel that intensity. And so what could he do with his music to feel that intensity? Well, he put this music to it that made it so tense. saying that when he arrived home and saw that on the television, it just caused him so much stress. And he's like, turn it this. So he turned the volume off, and he realized the moment he turned off the volume that it was the music that was causing him so much stress. And so that tells you just how much music can influence our emotions as we watch these films. And not to talk too much, but in the in the documentary score, a professor, Dr. Tan, talks about how music has a physiological effect on us, and I think this is a perfect example of that happening. So anyway, I thought it was pretty incredible.

Chris: 9:01

You know, I It's interesting and you're hitting on it there. But I think music can also, it can it can more than just amplify emotions. It can completely change how you're perceiving, it can, it can define what you're watching, for you in a sense. You know, I was thinking about not all movies, obviously, if you go far back had dialog in them, and so I thought about some of the Charlie Chaplin movies, you know, from the 30s. And I remember in film school watching a movie where he eats a shoe. There's a scene where he eats a shoe, and as with a lot of Charlie Chaplin movies on, there's Ragtime type music. It's very farcical and playful. So you're watching something that's comedic, you know? And I was thinking, if you swapped it out for like, sinister music, we would all be thinking, is this guy going to die from eating a shoe? Yeah? So it can kind of change how you interpret even what you're watching. And you know, to pull an example from, from television, I used to watch the show called Veronica Mars, and there's, there's a scene where a character, you know, invites his his daughter and her, what he's found out is an abusive boyfriend to dinner and and he plans to confront him. And not only does he confront him, he beats the living hell out of him, um, and what's playing the whole time he's beating this dude up is, is That's Amore', you know, which is a love song, just literally a love song. And I think it's, I think the music kind of gives you confirmation that it's okay to take joy in this dude getting beat up. Basically, it's kind of this, because you're watching this very violent act, but you're but they play this kind of love song to let you know, no, it's okay. He's a he's a dirt bag.

Terry: 11:05

Yeah, a couple of interesting things even go way back to what you started talking about music in the beginning, in the theaters and playing the organ. That it was interesting that early on, it was done live, which I thought before, as you said, they started distributing music to theater houses and pretty much playing the same thing, that gave the musician a lot of flexibility in deciding what to play and how to play it. You know, they could kind of feed off of the vibe in the theater. I thought that was kind of an interesting thing. And to your point, Chris, in terms of how you perceive things in the documentary Score, they were talking about King Kong and some of the scenes in there, and how adding music to that movie changed how the movie was perceived. And a lot of the scenes in particular, they were saying, just viewing it without the music, they looked kind of clunky. They're clunky and mechanical, but adding the music actually really gave you a completely different feel for the things that were going on.

Reba: 12:16

Yeah. I mean, you think about King Kong, you know, at the top of the is it the Empire State Building? I mean, you think about that without the music, and you know, he's just at the Empire State Building. And remember, film was not as fluid, then it wasn't as refined. So you look at King Kong at the top the Empire State Building with one of his arms out, and it just looks like nothing. But then you add the music to it gives you the sense of his power. So the music, it makes a huge, huge difference in how we feel these films, and to Chris's point, how we interpret these films. I'll give you one more. And not to stay on Psycho, but Bernard Herrmann also did, of course, the music for the shower scene. And so imagine Bernard Herrmann's looking at the shower scene, and, you know, and imagine seeing that scene with no music. So the understanding is kind of didn't want, didn't want any music on that scene, but Bernard Herrmann decided to put music to it anyway. And then when you put that music over and that shrieking music, it just seems so it's scary and it's, it's violent, and it's, it just makes all the difference in the world.

Excerpt from Psycho: 13:38

Music from shower scene in Psycho

Reba: 13:39

You just want to run away from it. You just want to escape from and it's continuous, so it's not like use your way out and the music doesn't resolve so that you can get out of it. So that was the brilliance of Bernard Herrmann. And so it's just interesting how those techniques help to bring film alive by figuring out ways to affect us physiologically.

Brandon: 14:04

Yeah, Mom, you're hitting the nail on the head, and we've all kind of touched on this, but you brought up Alfred Hitchcock and Bernard Herrmann as a pairing, and I feel like speaking of the emotions that we feel on things, nothing can really speak to the pairing and those emotions than Steven Spielberg and John Williams, who have always been paired together, and we know that they have produced several wonderful pieces, both in film and, you know, in terms of soundtrack, we're talking about the emotions we get from that. And Chris and I were talking about this in pre production, John Williams has hit on so many different things that I feel speak to specific emotions, so we can apply those to anywhere in life. For example, He's responsible for Jurassic Park. And you know, the dun dun, dun dun, like that whole thing leads to a little bit of, like, the adventure and wonder of something just so spectacular. He did Jaws. And the sound with Jaws is, anybody who's ever been in water after seeing the movie Jaws hears that in the back of their head, and now they're trying to search around in their personal in-ground pool, wondering if there's a Great White coming up. Yeah. That fear on purpose.

Excerpt from Jaws: 15:18

Theme from Jaws

Brandon: 15:19

Uh, conversely, though he's done Harry Potter, you know, and Harry Potter, to me, gives this idea of this magical wonder and everything like that. And so when I hear like, I'm instantly taken to the magical wizarding world and wondering, like, I believe every stick that I pick up is going to allow me to do some sort of spell. He just really hit on that. And then the other piece too, is Star Wars. You know, I brought up the fear of the unknown with the Jaws theme versus the Darth Vader theme from Star Wars. And every time I hear that, I'm wondering if my worst enemy is marching his way towards me, I feel like I can, it's a tangible fear when I hear the Star Wars theme versus the Jaws theme, where I'm like, where is the danger coming from? So he just does a good job of capturing all of those emotions that they apply to anywhere in life now at this point. I will, if I'm scared of something and I have no clue what it is or where it is, Jaws is probably in the back of my head, because I can't spot the danger, but that's what I'm thinking of. So just saying that the composers as a whole, they've done a really good job of hitting on all those kinds of things. One more I want to mention too is James Newton Howard, who, along with John Frizzell, did Dante's Peak. And I was talking about this with Chris as well. What I really enjoyed that they did was with the in credits music. I really enjoyed Dante's Peak, and they did a good job of having the volcano erupting without music at first, before adding the music. So that was really cool for me to feel immersed in the danger and then the music enhancing it. But what I liked with the end credits in that movie was I felt like that was like a, I don't remember how long it is, about eight to 12 minutes of music. That is like the perfect musical summary for the movie. I just enjoyed.

Excerpt from Dante's Peak: 17:17

Music from end credits for Dante's Peak

Brandon: 17:38

On the way, longer perspective, totally opposite side is the Lord of the Rings score. I don't need to watch any of that movie. I can put that score in from beginning to end, and feel like it has taken me on that entire journey that we ended up watching cinematically, like I just it was another very well done score that, you know, the intense moments were magnified, the adventure piece was magnified, the curiosity was brought up, brought to life. So that's another score that does the job, and in this case, obviously, Lord of Rings was a masterpiece in its own right, but the score itself really does the trick in taking you through the entire journey if you didn't have access to the visual. So another thing is that composers are not just responsible for those simple scenes, but they really are responsible for giving us an entire story by their music alone. With that all in mind, I just mentioned other composers. Do you guys have a favorite composer or soundtrack that you have enjoyed over time?

Terry: 18:38

In terms of soundtracks, you mentioned Jurassic Park already, but Saturday Night Fever. I know I'm kind of dating myself in terms of these things, but the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack and the Beverly Hills, cop, I just kind

Excerpt from Beverly Hills Cop: 18:51

Stir It Up from Beverly Hills Cop

Reba: 19:08

Gosh, you're that old?

Terry: 19:10

No, but you all have told me about them, so exposed me to those at my tender age.

Brandon: 19:19

For the audience we are answering

Chris: 19:21

You listen to them on your gramophone?

Terry: 19:23

Then there are iconic and then there are a few iconic songs or themes that come to mind, like you said, Brandon, the Jaws, themes and and Psycho, Star Wars, etc, things like that. There's a theme for Rocky that evokes a certain thought whenever I hear that. There's the Pink Panther, which is another classic one you hear that you instantly think Pink Panther, and then it's all the James Bond stuff with the you know, the great spy thriller.

Reba: 20:04

Yeah, I think Jurassic Park has got to be one of my favorites, and in terms of how we think about traditional film scores anyway, Jurassic Park is one of my favorites, and I think it has a great deal to do with what John Williams did when they left the island, when the helicopter took off from the island. It was the same music that played throughout, and I didn't even realize that until we talked about this in pre production, but he calmed the music down, and at that point, I felt safe, which was weird, because I I didn't realize that all that time, I felt like I was on that island with them. That I was in fear of what those dinosaurs would do to me. Even though, I was never, never at risk. I felt I was, which also shows you what a good job Spielberg did with Jurassic one, and I won't go any further than that. But when they left the island, John Williams that music, he just brought it down, and I felt safe.

Excerpt from Jurassic Park: 21:23

Theme from Jurassic Park

Reba: 21:24

I thought for him to even think to do that was just, I thought it was just brilliant. Another soundtrack that I thought was great, and it's from the 70s that your dad told me about is Shaft by Isaac Hayes, which is considered one of the best soundtracks in film, even though they don't typically talk about and we'll talk about this later, soundtracks with respect to traditional film scores, but it is considered one of the best selling soundtracks of all time. And then a song that I really like that was never well, maybe Brandon will ask this later, a song that was never used in a soundtrack that I wish had been is Don't Worry by Curtis Mayfield, which was used in the first season of The Deuce television show. I think that song is just an absolute jam, and I don't know why they didn't use it in subsequent seasons of The Deuce, but I like Curtis Mayfield's music anyway. But Don't Worry is just an absolute jam.

Excerpt from Curtis (album): 22:58

Curtis Mayfield's Don't Worry

Reba: 23:01

That's just an absolute jam, and it it needed to be used in all three, I think it was three seasons of The Deuce. Yeah, it needed to be used there.

Chris: 23:14

I agree wholeheartedly. I don't know maybe it's some licensing deal or something, but I got three. I'm gonna echo Jurassic Park, even though I have that third on the list, on my list. But I thought it's an interesting point, Mom, you made about feeling safe when he lowered the music, you know, the volume of the music at the end. I I, what I like about the soundtrack is that I feel like it, it does kind of encompass every emotion. It makes you think about the movie as a whole. Initially, my first thought is the conflict, the danger, you know, the life or death situations. That's like what I think about when I think about the movie. But when you think about the actual theme, it does give you the sense of a modern miracle, and what it, before danger sets in, the idea that we're brought into the same, that we bring a prehistoric species into the same time period and interact with them. And so, like the the miracle of that, I feel like, is what this the overall theme that everyone thinks of a Jurassic Park. That's what it captures. That like, you know, the the idea of just looking up and then just seeing a Brontosaurus, you know, at some island that somebody you know brought you to, so that that would be my, the most orchestral one at least, that I have on the list. The first one I had is actually, Remember the Titans. The composer for Remember The Titans was Trevor Rabin

Excerpt from Remember the Titans: 25:07

Theme from Remember the Titans

Chris: 25:08

I love the the theme of Remember the Titans, and I think it's interesting they even used it when President Obama was elected the first time at his rally for his acceptance speech. And I, one of the reasons I love it, though, is just because of all the music from the 70s that was made not for the movie, but, you know, Ain't No Mountain High Enough is in there. Spill the Wine is in there. Fire and Rain by James Taylor is in there. I'm forgetting, oh, Spirit in the Sky, like there's just a lot of just great 70s songs that, if you put, if you go to any streaming service and just put 70s radio on, they'll come up. And so I just think it as it did a great job. And for a movie that, you know, it's a period piece, and it's talking about an important moment in history, I think is it just that, all the music choices I thought, took me back to that. And what was second on my list was American Beauty. American Beauty won five Oscars. It was nominated for Best Film Score, which, I believe it won an Oscar? Was a, you know, I, I'm, I remember liking the movie. I don't know if it holds up, but I thought the film score was the first time I actually thought about because I didn't really buy soundtracks or anything, or look up music after I went to watch movies. But I was at the time I watched that particular movie, I was going into music school. And so the and, being a percussionist, I had my bias for what I like to listen to. I like percussion, heavy stuff. And so the American Beauty had a lot of, like, marimba pieces and and they had, they had bells and chimes, and they had that kind of stuff

Excerpt from American Beauty: 27:05

Music from American Beauty

Chris: 27:30

Because this guy's kind of experiencing this, um, midlife crisis or this awakening, and so they they had this kind of sad but also kind of hopeful music. And so I thought Thomas Newman, the composer, did a really good job of of bringing those emotions to the forefront. So those would be my three. Remember the Titans, American Beauty, and Jurassic Park.

Brandon: 27:57

And for myself, I was super excited to find out, because I didn't research it ahead of time, because I knew I wanted to see these two movies, Black Panther and Creed, and both were done by Ludwig Göransson. And for different reasons, I like those movies. I thought Creed was absolutely wonderful. It was another take on the Rocky franchise and taking it to another level. But I enjoyed exactly how he brought into different elements into that storyline. I thought the music really helped an excellent Baby Creed's journey, and then Black Panther, for all of the historical reasons for it and all the personal reasons for it.

Excerpt from Black Panther: 28:34

Theme from Black Panther

Brandon: 28:54

And that, I thought Ludwig Göransson did a good job of giving us how grand that city was as well as, you know, we connected with all the African themes and everything in there. So they were two different sounding scores for two movies that I greatly enjoyed. So I was really excited to hear that when I found out that he did both of those. But those are two of the scores for myself. And then going to soundtracks, Soul Food. And unlike the, unlike a score, you know, where the score is, all the background music, but Soul Food was the soundtrack, where so many original pieces told the story of that movie. And I remember my friends and I putting that CD on in the back room, as mom called us the Old Men's Club, and we would literally listen to that from beginning to end. And it really did kind of feel to a certain degree, like we were on that little journey of our own, because that movie's told through the eyes of the child, and we were children at the time, we kind of felt connected through that music as well.

Excerpt from Soul Food: 29:49

We're Not Making Love from Soul Food soundtrack

Brandon: 30:10

Those are two separate ones, you know, between a score and a soundtrack. But those have to be the top ones for myself. Um, only because I think Jurassic Park was trash. I don't know what you guys are talking about, because you're saying that this is one - I am absolutely lying, that is far and away one of the best soundtracks of all time. But there was so much love being given to it, I had to try and, you know, throw a curve ball in there. But no. John Williams has never made a bad score that I can ever recall. And he really just absolutely knocked it out of the park with Jurassic Park. And a special shout out to him as well, because we still to this day, he's he's also the creator of the Olympic theme that we hear every single year, so that's still lasting to this day, and that's the soundtrack of our athletic lives. So John Williams, bravo, sir. Jurassic Park was an absolute masterpiece.

Reba: 30:58

Yeah, he's the bomb.

Brandon: 31:01

Speaking of Remember The Titans, I cannot hear Remember the Titans without hearing Ain't No Mountain High Enough. I can't hear Ain't No Mountain High Enough without thinking about, Remember the Titans. But what's funny is that piece was not made, obviously, it was an older piece, so it wasn't made for that movie. It's interesting now that it is a, I cannot separate the two from each other.

Excerpt from Remember the Titans: 31:19

Ain't No Mountain High Enough from Remember the Titans

Brandon: 31:41

And then, of course, I don't think it made its way into the soundtrack, but I did enjoy the little chant that they had heading to the championship game. We are the Titans, mighty, mighty Titans. That's as much singing as you're going to get from me right now, with all of that

Reba: 31:56

I got one more movie, one more movie in here, Against all odds by Phil Collins, who is the bomb too? Against All Odds was, it was a good movie, and Phil Collins was the bomb percussionist, Chris, percussionist like you. So, yeah, just wanted, just wanted to add that, and Boomerang as well. Baby Face, yeah.

Brandon: 32:20

Oh yeah. Baby Face did a really good job with that soundtrack for Boomerang, Another one, where, if you listen to it from beginning to end, you feel like you're on that journey of that movie as well. So, yeah, yeah. With those in mind, we we kind of, in pre production, had a a I'll say we were viewing this word differently. But what is an unconventional soundtrack that you also have enjoyed. And when we were discussing some pre production, I was saying that unconventional maybe a little bit more of a personal term, only in the sense that for myself, when I was trying to answer this question, I thought of unconventional as what is something that I wouldn't have normally enjoyed that I did because it was challenging me from a from a musical perspective, something that I didn't normally listen to is a style that may have been different. For example, I mentioned Matrix Revolutions because not only did we have the normal compositions in there, but they had a lot more of the choir background, but it was like Gothic sound, which is not anything that you would find in my normal music repertoire, and yet, when that music is playing, I am absolutely hyped for this movie. I cannot enjoy it anymore if I had tried, and especially as that last piece of this trilogy was going along, I really felt like it was a perfect conclusion to that storyline. And so for me, that's what I thought of as unconventional, because it challenges something that I wouldn't normally have enjoyed a sound and I wouldn't have normally sought out for myself. Another thing about challenging too, was just challenging the way things normally worked. And so I brought up the Friday soundtrack, because while we have listened to music, be a part of soundtracks, in this case, it became a pop culture phenomenon because this movie was in a different setting. It was a comedy, and the soundtrack was one of the highest grossing soundtracks of all time, completely obliterating records at the time. And so that's unconventional, because normally we wouldn't have equated that style of music, a lot of urban music as being, you know, high selling, and in this case, it became the greatest of all time. So for me, unconventional hit both of those markers, and that's why I put them at the top of my list.

Terry: 34:33

Okay, for me, not for any particular work or anything like that. But what I found interesting was in the documentary Score where they talked about how many of the composers experimented with sound, so they came up with sounds to include in the soundtrack. And I guess I would consider that an unconventional way of composing a work for a film. They talked about where they actually had, like, metal, stainless steel bowls, and they were making kind of sounds on that, and they used that in a certain section of of this particular film, and how that was just, you might say, revolutionary in the way that they they use those sounds to create the effect that they wanted. But yeah, that would be it for me.

Chris: 35:26

I feel like you can define unconventional a lot of different ways. I think I have three or four, maybe even five different movies I could point to, because I think unconventional could be everything from who wrote the music to, you know, how the music fits in with the movie, versus what kind of music it is in general. So for my examples, would be challengers, which just came out last year, had a lot of kind of, you know, EDM, kind of like fast, pulsating EDM music during some of the tennis scenes, which you don't generally see in a sports movie. And so I found that to be kind of an interesting choice.

Excerpt from Challengers: Challengers: 36:20

Match Point from Challengers

Chris: 36:24

I don't remember exactly who the composer was.

Brandon: 36:25

The music was done by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross.

Chris: 36:29

Gotcha. But another example is The Great Gatsby, which came out in 2013 which you know, Jay Z was part of the soundtrack. And, you know, the film set in the 1920s the Roaring 20s, and there's a couple scenes where you're hearing songs with Jay Z's voice in them, and I don't think he's been around that long. Um, so, so I think it was unconventional from the sense of taking a period piece of putting a modern artist as popular as he is in, you know, into the soundtrack. So it was an interesting choice. It's, it's up to anybody, whether that worked or not. Another one is Garden State, which came out in '04, directed by Zach Braff. And he compiled the music himself and got a Grammy for, you know, Best Soundtrack compilation. And I what I just think is interesting about that it's, it's, it's how I feel I would, I would put together music if I was just making my own film, and then I didn't know any composers, and I didn't have the money for it, and I was just making my own film, and I didn't have to worry about licensing. That's probably how I would do it. I would just pick some stuff on my iPod that I thought sounded good in a certain scene, and that's essentially what he did. Um, another one I would say, is Hustle and Flow, which I think is a unconventional soundtrack, just from the standpoint that the the main character is rapping some of these songs.

Excerpt from Hustle & Flow: 38:15

It's Hard Out Here for ... from Hustle & Flow

Chris: 38:24

And, you know, it's not, he's not a musical artist. He's an actor, you know, I mean, he has musical talent, but, you know, it's a little different than I think Eminem doing 8-Mile songs in 8-Mile, it's like well he's a musical artist. You know, 50 Cent doing songs in his movie. He's a musical artist. But, like, you know, to have an actor doing the songs on the soundtrack, I thought was, you know, generally, made that a little unconventional. And then the last one I would bring up is movie I worked on, on the come up, which is on Paramount plus. And the reason I bring that up is because a rapper named Rapsody from North Carolina, she wrote all the, all the music for that song. And I think generally, you don't see a whole lot of that. So those would be just different ways. I would say define unconventional.

Reba: 39:19

So what's conventional? I'm truly asking this question, and what it what is conventional, then?

Terry: 39:28

Thinking about it, now, I think there are two types of conventional if you want to go down that path. One is the traditional, quote, unquote, traditional scores that you have where you bring in some composer. You have, you know, the spotting sessions with the director and the composer, and they talk about what the director's idea of the film.

Reba: 39:50

So you're talking about orchestral music, essentially?

Terry: 39:53

Yeah, essentially. And then, as you know, we kind of talked about a bit in pre production, and you and I talked about at breakfast. Uh, was compilation works where the soundtrack is a compilation of things that they picked, as Chris was saying from his iPod to conclude the movie, because they feel that this particular song fits the scene. Okay. So I think, you know, to some extent, that has become conventional for a lot of things in terms of how soundtracks are put together for film works, TV shows and and, you know, feature films both.

Brandon: 40:38

Yeah, I think dad hit the nail on the head. It's pretty much, you know, Symphony Orchestra style music, or orchestral based music, is the one big piece of conventional or, like you said, when you're literally going through your list and picking out songs to match the scenes and then moving on to the next that's what I feel like, is how people are coming up with these scores and soundtracks today, as opposed to our personal perspectives on what seems to be against that grain.

Chris: 41:05

Yeah, I mean, and from the examples that I was highlighting, I feel like it's orchestral music is one thing that we could call convention. I think another thing that we can call convention is just the intent of music complementing the scene, as opposed to kind of standing out from what's happening in the scene, or music not being anachronistic. You know, I brought up, Remember the Titans that it's about a story in 1971 all the music is from that era. So Jay Z choosing to do Jay Z songs on a movie about the roaring 20s, I feel like is unconventional from that perspective, you know. And then classically trained musicians as opposed to, you know. So those are some of the things I would call convention.

Reba: 41:59

Okay, okay,

Brandon: 42:02

Mom, did you ever get a chance to give us your idea, like your favorite unconventional soundtracks or scores?

Reba: 42:11

I talked about Vangelis in pre production, the composer who scored Chariots of Fire and Blade Runner who used a synthesizer her to do both, And that is not, you know, traditional orchestral music.

Excerpt from Chariots of Fire: 42:42

Theme from Chariots of Fire

Reba: 42:48

And so when I think about conventional, which I'm defining, it much more strictly than you guys have defined it here. And so I need to broaden my thinking about what is conventional. But as far as many other composers who score these big, lavish films like the Jurassic Parks and such, what Vangelis does is, you know, and using a synthesizer to score films is unconventional. He uses a synthesizer. They use orchestras. That's a departure from the way they typically score films. It's also much more efficient for him. He doesn't have to reserve, you know, studio space for as long, doesn't have to worry about acoustics in the way that they have to worry about acoustics. He doesn't have to worry about the size of the studio in the way that they do and so forth. And yet, you know, Chariots of Fire was an award winning film. I don't know about Blade, Blade Runner, but it was a popular film, for sure. But that's one example, I would think. I'm not saying that that's my favorite, but it is an example.

Brandon: 44:04

I think that fits perfectly for the category, though, like you said, I mean, we're talking about orchestral based, and you're saying synthesize, so that's not normal, at least from our perspective. It's not normal, it's not conventional. So I think that's a great one example for for everybody to call

Reba: 44:17

Slumdog Millionaire. Oh, it's unconventional because it was Indian.

Excerpt from Slumdog Millionaire: 44:35

Jai Ho from Slumdog Millionaire

Brandon: 44:41

Yes, that's a good that's actually a really good one.

Chris: 44:44

Yeah, other cultures use music in their films too, but and Bollywood's made it easy.

Terry: 44:52

Yeah, and just to tack on what you were saying about composers and and directors, and I'll say it again, and I say it almost every time we talk about any particular part of filmmaking is that I'm always fascinated by the level of detail, and this is just another part to that. When it comes to making a film, there's just so many parts, and you know, this is just one segment of it, but there's a lot of detail, a lot of work that goes into things that you kind of take for granted when you watch a movie, but you know, music being such an integral part of it, and they're the sitting, the spotting sessions and things like that, where they sit down and actually try to map out how the music is going to fit into the film.

Reba: 45:41

Seamlessly fit.

Terry: 45:42

Yeah, seamlessly, yeah right.

Reba: 45:44

That's the thing is the music, the music has just the music seamlessly fits into the film. Um, that's what's so amazing about this. It's not like, you know when, when he first began putting music to film, and that music set on top of it, and it was obvious it was sitting on top of the film, the music is now seamlessly fitting into this film, like, like another character that you can't, you can't see, but you can, sure enough feel.

Terry: 46:10

Yeah, and to tack on to that, I am amazed at the fact that they get this done and the time constraints. We haven't talked about that to this point, but it's generally the last thing done before the film is released. So whatever time they've got between the time the film has been edited to the its final point and the time it's going to get released is when the composers and the director have to get time to get together and actually come up with a score or soundtrack, or whatever they're doing. And then, to give a little bit of detail to how short that can be on Score, they did mention that Chinatown had the soundtrack done in 10 days. And I just can't imagine someone having less than two weeks to come up with the music for a film.

Brandon: 47:11

That's crazy, 10 days to try and get an entire movie score composed. I wonder if it was composed and recorded, or just at least. Well, no, I imagine you need to get it recorded to 10 days to 10 days to the whole process.

Reba: 47:22

Both. The interesting, the interesting thing about that is the movie is being promoted. They are seeing the movie up on billboards with release dates, and the score isn't finished yet. So talk about pressure. They have to get this done, but it shows you how good they are because they do it. I mean, but it also shows you how much pressure they're

Terry: 47:45

Yeah. under too. I mean, can you imagine these? I mean, for 10 days, 20 days, however many days they're given, they are probably working around the clock on caffeine. I hope there's a local coffee house nearby.

Brandon: 48:06

So, you know. So you're both reflecting this admiration that mom shared in the article, which you can find on cupofteacritiques.com/crumpets, so make sure you check it out. Speaking of the composers, though, and speaking of all of this hard work, how do composers connect and find work? I imagine for some it's a little bit harder than others, based on several different factors.

Reba: 51:44

Yeah, it's pretty challenging. So it's a small club. Film composers are a small club, especially the ones that you know are fortunate enough to score, you know, these really big, lavish films for the big name directors. And so my suggestion would be, you know, based on some of the readings I've done, my suggestion would be to just, if you're starting out in the field anyway, would be to keep it small. So in the article, I refer to, you know, an interview that COTC did with Greg Sgammato, who is a film composer, and he composes short films, and he also does TV as well. And then there's Pete Thomas, who's a very experienced British film composer who's done some of everything you can imagine, TV, short films, feature films, commercials. You name it, he's done it. And from Greg's side, Greg suggested you keep it small. Basically compose for films that you like to do. Try to start with short films, because that is an accessible club. Essentially, those kinds of films are accessible, those film directors are accessible. It's much more likely you can find work there, and it's a great way to build your portfolio. Pete Thomas says that a way to increase your access, he gives several suggestions, which I include in the paper, but one was to try to get jobs at establishments that are near studios, like coffee shops that are near studios, which I thought was pretty interesting. It would increase, you know, the chances of you running into, say, film directors or even film composers who work on some of these bigger films, and maybe you can land a spot on their team, or be able to slip them, you know, a copy of some of your work. So I thought that was a really good idea as well. There are some other suggestions that I include in the paper also. But if you, the bottom line is if you're getting started, try to keep it small, to build up your portfolio. Develop a website to put your work on your website, to increase your exposure as well. Pete Thomas also suggests being a part of a band, because you never know who might see you perform. He gave an example of a kid who was performing as part of his work, and after the performance, a woman walked up to him and said, hey, you know, can I have your card? Because I'd like to reach out to you to see if you'd like to do a commercial spot. It turns out she was the client of an ad agency, and they were asking his ad agency to do a commercial for them, and she wanted him to do the music for it, and his career took off from there. He did the music for that, and his career took off from there. So the point is, you never know who you might meet in these places. And so keep performing. Keep it small. Get a website, build your portfolio, try to get maybe a little part time job at, you know, some establishments near studios, you just never know what might happen.

Brandon: 55:00

Yeah, and in addition to that, though, we talked about how small the field is, and then, anyways, it's not harder for some people to get through than others. Mom, we mentioned this in pre production. The field being so small also means it's rather male dominated as well, so.

Reba: 55:19

Yeah, rather male dominated is, that's an understatement. It is. It is the most male dominated field I have ever encountered. It is, it is super male dominated, which obviously makes it very challenging for women to to break into. So I think they are going to, they're going to have to make their world small initially, get access to people who are doing, say small films and and try to get to know as many people in the field as you possibly can, you know, be as social as you possibly can, and get to know people who you know, who are like you and different from you. You want to widen your net so and, yeah, that's just how you gotta do it.

Brandon: 56:17

There's one composer I do want to give a special shout out on that, in that vein, is Pinar Toprak I mentioned during pre production. She used to work with Hans Zimmer, but you're talking about the person here that did the score for Captain Marvel, which the movie wasn't necessarily bad, but I will say that the score was probably the biggest highlight of that movie. It was very, very well done.

Excerpt from Captain Marvel: 56:39

I'm All Fired Up from Captain Marvel

Brandon: 57:00

I came across her when I was watching the show Krypton, and she's done several other pieces as well. She's been a part of Slumberland. She did the show Star Girl. She's actually made some of the music for the game Fortnite, and she even did it for the Paw Patrol movie that recently came out as well. So that's just one woman that's in the business, and we're hoping to find a lot more that get an opportunity to showcase their talent.

Chris: 57:22

We talked about composers having their level of privacy, or maintaining a level of privacy. And I think on some level, when we, when we talk about these things, we tend to have a bias toward bigger, bigger budget stuff, or more mainstream stuff, or more established names. I just think privacy is it's a privilege in a sense, like when you're an artist trying to make your way in anything, you really have to put yourself out there. I'm not saying, you know, to post your address everywhere or something, but I just think it's important to be your biggest advocate, you know, and to keep making your intentions known. And, you know, like, like Mom said, put yourself in those spaces. But um, I, I really don't think you you can afford to be shy or too private, in a sense. And I think your own biggest advocate, until you join a collective that might be able to help you know, ASCAP, for instance, American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers. There's BMI, which is specifically for, I think, jazz, blues and country artists. But there's you know different, there's just unions and collectives out there that might be able to advocate for you and try to help you find work.

Brandon: 58:44

One last question I do want to ask, like, as we're starting to wrap things up here is, you know, we've heard that. We've heard AI all over the place. So in what ways do you think that AI might influence film composing?

Chris: 58:58

I think right now we're in a time where people just hear AI and they tune out or they immediately disapprove. And I think AI, it can be used to help certain people or to supplement certain people, without just replacing people. So as far as where that fits in with music. I'm not familiar enough with AI software, but I do think Hans Zimmer is always going to be able to find work. I don't think AI is going to take down Hans Zimmer for lesser known composers or novices. You know, you do wonder if their skills get devalued a little bit. So I think, or if somebody who's just on a tight budget just chooses to go that route and and maybe they're willing to deal with the backlash of of having AI generated, you know, AI generated sound or music in their work because they're like, hey, look, I'm not going to get this done if I, if I can't do that or I'm not, I'm just going to have to leave that out entirely. Um, so, yeah, I mean, I think with all these things I do, I think the the less established names might be the most disproportionately impacted.

Terry: 1:00:21

For me, I don't think there's anything, and we're talking probably long term, short term, not sure, because AI is going to advance at the rate that it advances at, but I think there isn't anything that's not going to be affected by AI. And considering the time constraints, I think that this portion of filmmaking will probably be an area that gets influenced greatly. You, 10 days for Chinatown. I'm thinking that that's that's probably something that somebody's going, okay, we're at the end of this, and we've got, you know, two days to get it done. Plug some, I'm overly exaggerating here, plug it into AI, and we're done.

Reba: 1:01:11

Well, I tend to agree with, uh, Terry, it'll be very sad if it does, though. I tend to think, you know, to both you all's point that the high end films, I just don't see AI seeping into John Williams's work and Hans Zimmer's work. I just I don't see that happening. I don't think those big time film directors with those giant budgets and studios with major bank are going to go to AI for those big, lavish films. But I do think film directors with low budgets, some of the short films, I think they will, you know, the film, their budgets can be so small that I think they there's a very good chance that rather than even buying licensed music, they'll just rely on AI to do their soundtracks. The thing is, I think it'll be pretty obvious too, and I think they can be a big turn off. I think that's the risk they take, though, in doing that. So I hope they don't take that route. But unfortunately, I do think there's, like a lower tier of films in terms of budget that will probably go that route.

Chris: 1:02:31

If I had one last thing to say, I would say that they're, you know, they're recently out here in in Los Angeles, there was a festival called Credo 23 Film Festival. And the idea behind it is that all the films, I mean, I guess this is just honor system, basically, but all the film submissions can't have any artificial intelligence and any generative AI. And so if I were, if I were, you know, a composer or someone, an artist who feels like their work is on the road to being devalued, I would seek out film festivals such as this one, or resources such as this one, because you're at least going there and potentially connecting with people who have that same value. And so there are maybe some people who just draw a line in the sand and say, Well, look, if I have to use AI to do something, I'm not going to do it. I'm going to try to make sure I'm always prioritizing people. And so I would seek out resources like that where you can find like minded people. Yeah,

Reba: 1:03:36

Good idea. Yeah, good suggestion.

Brandon: 1:03:38

That's a great idea, Chris. And I think that's right where we can go ahead and stop this one right here. So that's going to wrap up this edition of the Cup of Tea Critiques Podcast. Thanks so much for listening and figuring out your"cup of tea" along with us. Honestly, we could go on like we do at our dinner table, but we look forward to you joining us again next week for another great discussion. Be sure to rate and follow the podcast. Also, is there a genre of music you think is underrepresented in film, leave a comment and let us know? You can stay in the loop on all things COTC by subscribing on our website at cupofteacritiques.com. You can also find us on Facebook. Check out our Instagram,@cupofteacritiques, and on Letterboxd at COTCritiques. For Reba, Terry and Chris, I'm Brandon. We'll see you next week for another deep look with a deep brew.