Hi! How did your collaboration with “The Real Murders of Atlanta” come about, and what was your initial reaction when you were approached to create music for this true-crime series?
A: It was actually the other way around: Part of my work is writing production music, that is music that’s produced to then be used by producers and editors of TV series or films. The producers of “The Real Murders of Atlanta” started to use several of my tracks in last year’s season of the show and I could write more for it along the way. I’m very happy that some of this music is now available on streaming platforms for everyone to hear.
Your music plays a crucial role in building suspense in the series. Can you describe your creative process for composing tracks that enhance the tension in true crime storytelling?
A: As with all music for film and TV, it’s important to convey emotions in the music. For a true crime series, these are mostly darker emotions like fear, grief or general tension and suspense. I somehow always leaned towards these darker emotions in all my music, so that helps in writing 😉
When writing I generally envision a scene or certain (sometimes generic true crime) topic and write the music I think fits best for it. As it is written without a specific scene to write for, it needs to have several stages that build towards a bigger climax.
Given the dark and intense nature of “The Real Murders of Atlanta,” how do you ensure that your compositions resonate with the emotional depth of each case without overshadowing the narrative?
A: I think the important thing is not to have too many elements in the music that would distract from the narration or dialog. You need to play the emotions with just a few notes. As much as I love epic and big film scores or songs, I also always liked that minimal approach – using instruments and their specific sound to conjure up images without drawing too much attention to the music and away from the action on screen. Also, I always produce several versions of each track – for instance one without the melody parts or one without percussion – that give the producers and editors more reduced variations that they can use for certain scenes. The editors on “The Real Murders of Atlanta” do an awesome job in editing the music to the scenes, often with seamless transitions from a full version to one of the reduced variations. They have a great musical or rhythmic sense that they use to great effect.
You have a diverse background in music, from classical training to composing for various media. How has this diversity influenced your approach to composing for a true crime series?
A: From my childhood on, I always have been soaking up any music and I love to mix different genres or bring unusual instruments and sounds into a song or instrumental piece that others might not use in that particular style. I like to experiment, and while the music for a true crime show like “The Real Murders of Atlanta” has to be in a certain wheelhouse and mostly in the same musical context, I sometimes add unusual flavors to keep it interesting. Most of these are only subtle elements, but they keep it exciting for me and I hope for the audience as well.
Can you discuss any specific challenges or memorable moments you encountered while creating music for the first 10 episodes of “The Real Murders of Atlanta”?
A: The biggest challenge with a project like this is that the music is written in advance and not directly to picture. So you don’t exactly know where and how it will be used. So that needs some imagination of scenes that come up in a true crime series – from interviews to re-enacted murders to witness accounts and confessions. It also has to be very modular with different parts that build towards a final climax, but without the transitions feeling robotic or generic. It still needs to have that organic flow of a typical score piece.
Now that your music from the series is available on streaming services, what do you hope listeners will experience or take away from these tracks outside of the show’s context?
A: When releasing new music, I always hope that the listeners will be drawn into that musical universe, the imaginary world that the music hopefully conjures up for them. Even without watching the series, the music should be exciting and not boring to listen to – something I always try to do, even with the most minimal film scores.
How do you balance the need to be respectful and sensitive to the real-life events depicted in the series while still delivering a compelling musical score?
A: I think that music as an additional layer is organically sensitive to the events, because it is written as an additional hint to what’s going on in a certain scene or to specific emotions. The important thing when writing music for any film or TV series is to tap into these emotions and actions, and translate them into music – or more generally translate them into sound, as often it doesn’t even have to be a melody that conveys these emotions. One minor chord played with somber strings can sometimes say more than a big arrangement of different instruments.
Could you share insights into how your work on projects like “Halloween Obsessed” and “The Things We Cannot Change” influenced your approach to scoring “The Real Murders of Atlanta”?
A: The first two were written directly to picture, so the inspiration came instantly from what is on screen and what’s said in the narration or dialog (or sometimes what the music has to add to fill in the audience to unseen emotions or unheard thoughts of the protagonists), while for “The Real Murders of Atlanta” the music was written in advance to certain emotions and generic scenes. In this case the composer has to imagine these scenes and create fitting music that the editors easily can use as they see fit. Also, the ongoing documentary series “Halloween Obsessed” is special in that it gives me the opportunity to bring in very different genres as the episodes touch on all the different aspects around Halloween – from haunted houses to Halloween-themed weddings and modern day witches. It really has pretty much every human emotion that the music needs to support, while in true crime the music mostly needs to drive the suspense. But the creative diversity from “Halloween Obsessed” comes back when writing for “The Real Murders of Atlanta,” as I try to bring in some subtle musical elements that are not necessarily traditional true crime elements.
In your opinion, what is the key to creating an effective musical score for a true crime series, and how does it differ from composing for other genres like comedy or horror?
A: I think the basics are the same: The music needs to support the (sometimes unseen or unheard) emotions and thoughts of the protagonists, or underline what’s happening on screen. The musical genres of course are quite different, ranging from funny to very dark and thrilling. The composer needs to tap into each and write music that fits and supports all of these. For true crime there are of course some typical elements you will almost always find in the music: a few eerie piano notes, some somber strings, maybe some pulsing elements like an arpeggiated synth line. The trick is to use these musical elements effectively and with great imagination. For me these darker themes seem to come naturally, and it’s hard to explain how exactly I come up with them. But it always comes down to understanding and tapping into the emotions played out on screen.
Looking forward, can you give us a sneak peek into your upcoming projects, like “Be More Popcorn” and “Steel Will,” and how they might differ from your work on “The Real Murders of Atlanta”?
A: “Be More Popcorn” is a fun, very adult animated LGBTQ+ comedy series that hopefully will be produced soon. I wrote the music for its pilot that is currently pitched to producers and studios. It is a really funny, kind of a “Tales Of The City” meets “South Park” thing. The short movie “Steel Will” on the other hand is a cyberpunk-inspired boxer drama with the music being a mix of orchestral and electronic instruments, including a little sonic hat-tip to Vangelis’ score for “Bladerunner.” I hope that this will be made into a feature as the basic story is a very human one about life’s challenges, friendship, setbacks and relationships.
The difference is mostly in musical genres. Especially “Be More Popcorn” is musically all over the place – from typical comedy to disco to drama, and a little piece in the vein of the theme from “Mission Impossible.” Really fun to write all these different styles in only one project.