David Christensen, an instructor in the Audio Production program at the AIS, opened the meeting by welcoming the 60 AES members and guests to the Art Institute of Seattle for the October meeting.
Dave Tosti-Lane, AES PNW Vice Chair, (and Chair of the Performance Production Department at Cornish College of the Arts and a sound designer), explained that a slide show of the recent AES convention in Los Angeles was planned, but the computer containing the slides decided not to boot. Instead, Jeffrey Bruton, who had attended the show, was invited to come forward and give his perspective, in which he described his impression of a demo of DSD (Direct Stream Digital), noting that it was "digital that sounds like analog."
Dave Tosti-Lane then introduced Hummie Mann.
Hummie began his presentation by talking about his background. He has been in the film scoring business for over 20 years. He moved to LA from Toronto, and started working with Doc Severinson and "The Tonight Show" band. He also worked with Aretha Franklin, the "Queen of Soul." He has 40 films to his credit, including "Robin Hood: Men In Tights," "Thomas and the Magic Railroad," and the IMAX film "Cyberworld 3D," and hundreds of television shows, including "Moonlighting" (one-third of the music from that show was his).
He attended Berklee College of Music in Boston and majored in composition. His specialty is working with orchestral scores, but he does enjoy working with different styles of music, including rock, jazz, and electronic music.
Hummie then gave us a run-down on film scoring. Many people don't realize that in a typical recording session, the musicians come in and sight-read the music, learn it, and record it in a very short period of time. It is amazing the level of proficiency that these musicians have to be able to learn a piece of music in that short of a time and commit it to tape.
Animation music has its own special requirements. A lot more work goes into scoring the music to fit the action of the animation (i.e., Bugs Bunny tip-toeing behind Elmer Fudd). On the average, Hummie can score about three minutes of music a day, but with animation it is about one minute a day.
Hummie played the EPK video showing the recording of an orchestra for the score to Cyberworld 3D, with Hummie conducting. It was recorded at Manta Sound in Toronto, using an 85 piece orchestra, over about a day and a half.
Hummie explained the difference between an orchestrator and a composer. An orchestrator chooses what instruments play what parts of the already composed music. A composer writes the music and decides what instruments play the parts.
He writes by hand, using a 12-line sketch. He finds that he works faster by hand than by using a computer with notation software, because software can cause errors that aren't always obvious, so it requires another level of proofreading (e.g., it can cause enharmonic problems, for example, by recording an A-flat rather than a G-sharp). It can cause quantization problems, where the notes aren't properly aligned between parts, and there can be problems with copy and paste, where an error is regenerated many times over.
Hummie was asked how he writes. He said he doesn't sit at a piano and write as many people do. He's found that people who write at the piano have tight voicings (the restriction of the reach of the hand), and don't utilize the open voicings of an orchestra. Instead, he hears the themes in his head and writes them down, then fine tunes them with the piano.
Some things that a composer must be conscious of when scoring are the voicings and range of the instruments. Electronic scoring (MIDI to score) can create notes that don't even exist on some instruments. A synthesized version of an orchestration doesn't necessarily sound okay for an orchestra and live instruments playing together in a room. The voicings have to be written differently for a live orchestra in a room.
The work print version gave us a point of reference. Hummie explained that the spotting session is when the composer sits with the director to decide where the music is going and what kind of emotion it should convey. This occurs after the filming is finished.
The other composer's version was characterized as uneventful behind the scene where the woman is going on the biggest adventure of her life. The tempo and feel is very slow and sleepy. It takes place in a part of the world that has a really strong genre attached to it (Scotland), and the other composer didn't take advantage of it at all.
Hummie's version is the finished version. The film is bigger - fits the screen - and is color-corrected. When Hummie got a call from Rob Reiner to re-score the film, he met with Rob and the director (Peter Yates), and they suggested that they buy a song from the Chieftans for the film. Hummie said, "Let me have the weekend to come up with a few themes. If you like it, we don't need to buy a Chieftans song." He went out and bought all the Chieftans recordings he could find, to get the style they were after: very upbeat, with a Scottish/Irish flavor.
So the process that a composer has to go through is 1) write the themes for the film and 2) make them malleable enough so they can work in different emotions and fit the action of the film. Sometimes it takes longer to get the tempo and timing right than it does to write the music.
Another thing you have to do when you're writing is treat the score like a character in a movie. The theme should change throughout the film, much like a character changes from beginning to end.
For example, he played the theme as it was written for the love scene in the movie, to demonstrate how it changed for that emotion.
Hummie used to teach a film scoring class at UCLA. He started one here in Seattle independently five years ago, the Pacific Northwest Film Scoring Program, and it has been very successful. His classes have scored 21 films, using orchestras of up to 45 pieces.
A student must score a film, and it must be a student film (student project) that is a requirement for completing the student's class. Films from WWU, Seattle Film Institute, Bellevue Community College, and Seattle Central Community College have been scored.
There are three 10 week classes that take place once a year:
Film Scoring 1: Provides an overview of the process of film scoring
Film Scoring 2: Orchestration and Composing to Timing
(Must complete Film Scoring I, or complete a music project and take a theory exam as a prerequisite)
Orchestrating for the recording studio
Run-through of the process in more detail
Film Scoring 3: Directed Study in Film Composition.
Score a film (students pick a film and score it)
Music Works Northwest is where he does the orchestral tracks. The musicians are students, and the concertmaster is paid.
Some of the films from his classes have actually been sold and been shown on HBO and Lifetime, and some have won awards at film festivals.
How did you get started?
Hummie started playing guitar at age six and started writing songs right away.
What is your main instrument?
It used to be guitar, but Hummie found that people would judge him as a musician by his guitar playing and, because he wasn't great at the guitar, he felt he couldn't convince people that he knew what he was doing musically.
Do you hire an orchestra that plays together or do you hire individual musicians?
When picking an orchestra, he'll request musicians in the area that he knows are good, and hire the rest through a contractor.
What things do you like when working with filmmakers?
Jonathan Kaplan is a filmmaker he works with often. Before locking the picture, he'll bring Hummie in and is willing to adjust the picture to fit the music. When he mixes, he does dialog/music/sound effects, in that order, rather than the more traditional dialog/sound effects/music.
What things do you hate?
Hummie hates working with a director who uses inappropriate temp scores and won't change them afterward. Why hire a composer if you already have the music?
What's a typical mic'ing technique for an orchestra?
The main mic'ing for an orchestra is a tree over the conductor, with left, center, and right microphones, and two surround mics in the back. Individual mics are used only to reinforce instruments that don't come through.
Do you mix in real time or do you use separate tracks?
Actually, you do both. You do a live mix as you go, and you record to separate tracks in case you need to make adjustments later.
Do you have perfect pitch?
Hummie has excellent relative pitch, and teaches his students how to identify the range the instruments play in. The timbre of the instrument can change depending on the range it is playing in.
Hummie cautioned against using preexisting songs in a film because it brings people back to their own experiences when they first heard the song, and it takes them out of the movie.
Thanks to Hummie Mann for taking the time out of his busy schedule for this presentation, and to the Art Institute of Seattle for providing the use their facility.
Report written by Dave Franzwa, AES PNW Section Committee Member