• Genre: Documentary
• Music Style: Orchestral, Ambient
• Director: Jesse Winton
• Studio: The Wintons Motion Pictures
• Score Length: 22:12

“Rescued: The Movie” is a documentary about the heart of adoption and caring for orphans. Composing the music for documentaries requires special care to ensure that the music truly sits in the background and does not interfere with the dialog, which in most documentaries is almost constant. However, I wanted to deviate a bit from the standard approach of creating almost unrecognizable underscore music that simply just sits in the background. The music needed to support the attributes of the story, while at the same time supporting the call-to-action in the film, which is to raise awareness of the current state of adoption and mobilize the viewing audience to become involved and provide solutions.

Being an adoptive family ourselves, there was the desire to let the music tell the story from a child’s perspective, even though all interviews were conducted with adults. This is audible in the music, as many child-like themes are introduced and developed, along with elements such as a boys chorus and other attributes. The music takes a gentle and delicate approach with soft themes and lush melodic string movements.

The original soundtrack for “Rescued” is available in the online store.

• Genre: Short Film
• Music Style: Orchestral, Electronic, Ambient
• Director: Jean-Marc Le Deux
• Studio: WarCry Entertainment
• Score Length: 07:50

Working with Jean-Marc on his excellent award-winning short film “The Save” was an iterative process, making refinements to the score as it was composed. This was done to ensure that it became the integral part of the film that it needed to be. With the exception of short narrations at the beginning and end of the film, no dialog was used. So the sound design and the film’s score became central elements and as such needed to not only stand out, but become actors in their own rights. The approach taken was to direct the music scoring in similar ways as the director would approach working with an actor.

This was a very gratifying process, especially knowing that the music would play this pivotal role in the film. So very often, the music takes a backseat and becomes a supportive element, and rightfully so, especially when dialog is present. Not so with “The Save”. The music’s job was to stir the scenes emotionally and complement the story in a creative way.

This is the film’s log line:

“A distraught young pitcher finds himself alone on the mound facing a dire situation of his own design; it’s bottom of the 9th, bases loaded, no outs. With his team only up by one, and the crowd roaring in disapproval, the pitcher stares at one empty seat… this was never about a game.”

One of the festivals has selected the film out of 500 submissions in the category for Best Music. It will be screening at the Super Shorts International Film Festival in the UK and on Dailymotion on December 11th, 2011.

Among the judges are notables Philip Bloom and Rupert Grint who has been acting in the Harry Potter films.

I am honored to have had a chance to score the music for the film, which is an allegorical story about a distraught young pitcher finding himself alone on the mound facing a dire situation of his own design; it’s bottom of the 9th, bases loaded, no outs. With his team only up by one, and the crowd roaring in disapproval, the pitcher stares at one empty seat. This was never about a game.

Follow the film at http://thesavemovie.com/

The Save Original Soundtrack by Jurgen Beck

• Genre: Promotional Trailer
• Music Style: Orchestral, World
• Director: Robert Cook
• Studio: Submission Productions LLC
• Score Length: 2:00

This is a new production by Submission Productions, LLC. The film is currently in pre-production, which may be surprising to see a promotional trailer of this magnitude and quality created at those early stages. This speaks of the extremely high quality that director Robert Cook is shooting for as the production moves forward. It was a pleasure working with both Robert Cook and extremely gifted cinematographer James Burgess in creating the score for the trailer.

The progress on Eleventh Hour can be followed on the official website or on Facebook.

• Genre: Short Film
• Music Style: Electronic, Orchestral
• Director: Trey Ore
• Studio: Quiet No More Pictures
• Score Length: 20:00

Trey Ore could be described as the dream director, at least from a composer’s perspective. When a director fully trusts the composer to create a compelling score for his film, creatively anything is possible. This has been one of those opportunities and not only was the process of creating the music for the film extremely satisfying, but with the creative freedom given by Trey, we were able to explore a number of interesting aspects of the score.

Set in a parallel time, the film has a sort of post-apocalyptic feel and the music needed to represent it. We could have gone into a number of different directions, but decided to use a musical signature for the film making use of electronic elements merged with an orchestral approach to scoring.

This is the film’s log line:

“Notorious for his role of judge, jury and executioner for the corrupt modern Government, Paul meets with a terrible, blinding accident that transforms the way he sees the world and the dreaded ‘Way-People’.”

The film is directed by gifted filmmaker Trey Ore and includes a very talented cast, among which is his wife Vanessa and daughter Micaela Ore.

After having seen the rough cut and having had a chance to enjoy the extremely high production value of the film, I am looking forward to adding the musical signature to the film. Production details can be found on the film’s Facebook page and the official website.

For more information about the production, please visit the official website at the official website.

Here is the current teaser trailer for the TV pilot:

This year, the judges worked through a record submission of 250 films, including documentaries, short films, commercials, and other categories. Among all feature film submissions, the SAICFF judges chose from eight films that screened as semi-finalists, with The Penny taking the best feature film award.

In addition to meeting up with the Film Weavers production team, it was a delight to also meet in person two of the actors of the film, Dan Bell and Kyle Walters. After spending time scoring the film in the studio and watching them act it was a pleasure of chatting with them.

I am extremely proud of the team at Film Weavers, as this is a recognition of their hard work and dedication in producing their latest film.

• Genre: Short Film
• Music Style: Acoustic, Electronic, Orchestral
• Director: Philip Leclerc, Chris Leclerc
• Studio: Leclerc Brothers Motion Pictures
• Score Length: 3:03

Philip and Chris Leclerc produced a short film for Sheboygan county, Wisconsin. Originally attached to score the complete film, I produced and co-composed the score with talented composer Ben Botkin due to a pressing family health matter.

The section of the film I scored needed an orchestral epic feel with progressive elements in it. The cue contains a nice build-up, coinciding with the narrative content of the film, climaxing in the last scene before the credits roll. Once the credits roll, we needed to close the chapter with a nice outro that would give the viewing audience a reflective moment after the big emotional build.

The film is a promotional production for Sheboygan County in Wisconsin, Philip and Chris’ home turf. It includes fantastic aerial shots and displays activities and sceneries in a visually stunning fashion. No surprise there, given the brother’s creative talents working with natural light. Another highlight of the production is the narration, which is masterfully done by Harvey Gold. Harvey’s long experience in lending his voice talents to great productions has certainly added another dimension to the production.

Initially scheduled to produce the music for the complete film, due to time constraints I was only able to score the last of the three cues the 10-minute film uses. The talented Ben Botkin took over and created the first two cues of the film with a job well done.

Below is the last section of the film, which adds an emotional climax, highlighting final thoughts in the film. During the premiere screening in November 2010 to a packed theatre, the audience cheered and cried during the final moments of the film, an indication that the merging of the visual story telling, the content, and the music all came together in showing Sheboygan county at its best. A job well done, Philip, Chris, and team!