A minute a day keeps the deadline away...

I wish is was so - unfortunatly I don't have the luxury of keeping this pace - but for the last two days I have composed and recorded very close to one minute a day - wich is generally what a composer can expect to manage in one day. Mind you, I have shaped the sounds and played and recorded everything too :) The next scenes are going to be scored faster (I hope...:)


What's new?

Well, the music for the scenes you can watch in this clip are actually vital to the score/movie. It sets the general boundaries and mood of the movie. And it introduces the second main charater, the "Teddy bear gone Angelic" Fuggles. I will elaborate a bit on the different aspects here:)

Boundaries and Mood

This is basicly defining what kind of universe we are visitors in. For example, How scary is Fuggles? How frightned does Milo get? Is is a childrens movie? Or a movie that explores the supernatural from the perspective of a grown up?? How dramatic should the movie be?

Milo is alone, he is deeply sadened by the loss of his parents, he is in a hospital, it's dark, it's evening and suddenly he hears something fall over and realises that there is somebody or something in the room with him.

This has been a tricky balance to find. And Fuggels theme would be the theme that set the stage. First I tried to create ONE theme for Fuggles - a theme that had it all - but it seemed I needed more. What worked was to create two themes for Fuggles. One for when Milo doesn't know what or who is there (but the theme should still, for the viewer, point in the direction of Fuggles) and one for when Milo sees Fuggles (his old teddy bear). I will get into the two themes further down in the blog, but the solution was to use the old "music box" cliche to bring us back to Milo's childhood but at the same time keep the viewer in the dark as to what is going to come next. A music box can be the prelude to a child or a motor saw maniac:). The tension is then nicely resolved by cancelling all sense of danger with the old, familiar sound of the acoustic piano - and on top of that playing a harmless, nice melody in D-major.

Wow, I can feel that there is SO much to tell - I think I recorded around an hour worth of music, that was never used, in order to get the right themes, feel and sound for these 2 minutes:)

I have (just for fun) attached a video with some scary music that was never used. This was part of a long journey that included recording loads of new music and sounds, and the idea was that the human voice would help open up the score.... well, eh, after spending half a day on it I realized I was, well, wrong... hmmm



Fuggles Theme x 2

Muic box theme:
To put it short Fuggles needed something to hint at his supernatural background. He is an angel coming to Milo in the form of Milo's old, favorite teddy bear. Adan and I agreed that somekind of elv-ish vibe would fit him. But the movie doesn't have the vibe of the elves to connect with too much "lord of the rings" feel in the music. So I wrote a theme (the music box) that is actually a bit celtic at heart (Especially if you notice the turn at the end when it goes back to the dominant a bit prematurely) and I played it with a shlightly distorted music-box sound. I thin k that did the trick. This theme will return later in the movie. Well, they both will.

Piano-theme
Here I needed something to show Milo's warm feelings for fuggles and to reflect all the good times they have spend together. After trying dozens of things it turned out a nice, warm piano-thing did the trick. I allways smile when I watch the place where Milo laughs - the music and movie goes really well together here, I think.
I play everything by hand. That has many disadvanteges but also some advanteges. Notice the little hesitation in the music when Fuggels raises his finger at Milo - This is the kind of "organic perks" that are thrown in for free when one is working "ecological":)



The next thing to come is the astroid/cosmic journey!!! I am looking forward to that one - Yay!!!!!

I hope you enjoy this little peek - many things can still change but I am working at a nice pace and we are well on the way.

Thank you for reading - and enjoy your summer:)

All the best

Nicky



"Milo meets Fuggels" - The two themes for Fuggles.




"Scary music"- version. This will not be used in the movie but it illustrates very well the corners one has to turn to get home in this buisness. It was good fun and it was necessary - AND I lost a lot of time :)