The Three Fundamental Principles of Film Scoring
Photo by Jeremy BrooksWriting original music for film can be a complex and nuanced endeavor, with hundreds of different unique topics to study and develop. However the most important elements can be simplified down to a few basic principles.Three of those important fundamental principles are how the music feels, how the music fits to picture, and how a single cue relates to the overall score.These are the most critical elements to focus on. Let’s look at them in more detail, and in what I believe to be order of importance.
1. How The Music Feels
More important than anything else is the emotional response your music creates.If you have the wrong mood none of the other elements matter. This goes beyond simply being appropriately happy or sad, and includes pacing, texture, color/instrument choices, harmonies, melodies, etc.It’s important to remember the music shouldn’t just echo back what the audience can already see on screen and figure out for themselves from context. The music is a chance to add another layer of subtlety or richness to a scene, for example telling us just how heartbroken or elated a character is, or wether the seemingly innocent looking cabin is actually full of zombies.If the music is exactly the right feeling, it is less important if it hits every single little cut, or if it thematically blends with the rest of the score. This is why songs can work so well. They might not be crafted by hand to picture, but they create the right mood, and that’s priority number one.
2. How The Music Fits To Picture
A score that blends seamlessly with picture should not be underrated.I have found that students often have a great fear of overdoing hits and sync points. They think that if the music hits too many moments, they will be guilty of “Mickey Mousing”, and will have created something cartoonish and immature. As a result, they end up hitting far too little and the music barely feels like it belongs at all. It comes down to balance and approach.The more experienced I get at writing music to picture, the more significance I give to having the music fit as snuggly as possible. To paraphrase a comment I once read from a colleague, the music should fit the picture like a glove. Music and picture should be so perfectly timed that the two should seem like they have always existed as a single unit and can never be separated.Cuts are the easiest things to hit without drawing too much attention to the music, because a cut is naturally jarring anyway. A hit also doesn’t have to be hit forcefully to be meaningful. Simply “acknowledging” a moment by having the chord change right on time, or even a single melody note rise or fall exactly in sync with an action, can be a subtle enough gesture that we don’t “hear” it, but present enough that we “feel” the symbiosis.Err on the side of too many hits, and you can always tone it down later. But if you err on the side of too few, your music might not even feel like it belongs.
3. How A Single Cue Relates
One of the most fun parts of being a film composer is developing themes and motivic ideas that represent different characters, places, and concepts. Most of us were inspired to become film composers in the first place by great scores like Star Wars, which is famous for it’s richness of themes.Thematic unity is an extremely important consideration, however it’s a layer of richness and complexity that enhances an already great score, not the most important element. If the music is the wrong mood, or if it doesn’t seem to fit very well to picture, who cares if you happened to choose the right character’s theme for the scene?The craft of creating themes and deciding which-to-use-where is a topic for another day, for now I just want to stress that it comes last in our list of three foundational principles. Themes are what make a good score great but should not be your primary focus.-------As I said in the introduction, there are plenty of more topics and considerations that go into creating a film score. These three are the most important aspects to consider. Get them right, and the rest is icing on the cake.