The Here Now Project receives its film festival premiere on April 26, 2024 at 5:15pm in Toronto at the venerable Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival, the largest documentary festival in North America. The film first screened in January of 2024 at the Climate Hub Davos during the World Economic Forum annual meeting. This groundbreaking feature-length documentary by Emmy-winners Jon Siskel and Greg Jacobs is built out of thousands of hours of in-the-moment footage—no narration, no talking heads. "The Here Now Project transforms the ordinary act of shooting a cell phone video into the radical act of bearing witness, capturing both the simultaneous, global nature of climate change itself and the deeply human resilience, resourcefulness, and courage needed to confront it. At once epic and intimate, the film is a wake-up call to the world from the world. The message: We’re all in this, together." Every sound in the musical score was created over the course of several weeks by processing the audio contained in the documentary's source footage. The resulting collection of 59 digital instruments was then christened "The Here Now Orchestra" and used to create the entire score. Click here to listen to score samples.
A MOTHER’S LOVE - coming in 2024
My next feature is A Mother’s Love, a supernatural thriller written and directed by Patrick Roberts and produced by Julie Snyder. Principal photography wrapped recently in Louisville, KY, and post will take us through early spring 2024. Since the film features a piece of music as part of the story I was brought on early to create that piece for the shoot - and I do always appreciate to be part of a film early, to be able to visit the set and get started on the music. I cannot share too much about the music at this point, except to say that it will be very high-concept in a way that is both intimate and mysteriously deep. More soon!
Mychael Danna Master Class at Industry Days at the 2022 Chicago International Film Festival
It was an honor to moderate a Master Class by my esteemed colleague, Academy-award-winner Mychael Danna, as part of Industry Days at the 2022 Chicago International Film Festival. Great advice and insights for all the composers and filmmakers in the room - including the insight that that distinction is meaningless: Regardless of which craft we contribute, if we contribute to a film, we are filmmakers.
My score to AMERICAN TRAITOR: THE TRIAL OF AXIS SALLY was nominated for an SCL Award in the category “Outstanding Score for an Independent Film.” The Society of Composers & Lyricists, the premier organization for composers and songwriters working in visual media, hosts the annual SCL Awards, which celebrate excellence and innovation in music for visual media. Following a similar model to guild awards like the DGA Awards, the SCL Awards are the only awards for music in visual media that are entirely and only voted on by composers and songwriters. While it did not win, I continue to be humbled and thrilled by the company I got to keep on this nominee’s list…
Al Pacino in “American Traitor: The Trial of Axis Sally”
The feature drama AMERICAN TRAITOR: THE TRIAL OF AXIS SALLY, directed by Michael Polish and starring Al Pacino, Meadow Williams and Thomas Kretschmann is now playing on all streaming outlets - and so is the soundtrack album! A DVD/BluRay version is also available. The film is based on William Owen’s book Axis Sally Confidential and tells the true story of Mildred “Axis Sally” Gillars, the American who became the voice of German propaganda targeted at U.S. troops during World War II. The classic Hollywood score with a Jazz tinge (think Bernard Herrmann, or “Far from Heaven” Elmer Bernstein) features alto flute, alto saxophone, contrabass clarinet, french horn, flugelhorn, vibraphone, harp and string orchestra. To listen to the score, click here.
Sal Lopez in “Spiked”
SPIKED, a social justice feature drama based on a true story so strange it gives the film comedy undertones, was released by Gravitas Ventures. When the murder of a migrant worker shakes a southwest border town to its core, the feud between a newspaper owner and the chief of police leads to the blurring of the truth and a dirty fight for justice. Starring Aidan Quinn, Carlos Gómez, Deirdre Lovejoy and Danay Garcia. The score features various acoustic instruments and electronic sounds, and a lot of bajo quinto that I bought from my friends at Chicago’s La Voz Hispana. To hear the score, click here.
How’s it going, my excellent friends? I had the totally unprecedented honor of writing and producing “That Which Binds Us Through Time: The Chemical, Physical and Biological Nature of Love; an Exploration of The Meaning of Meaning, Part 1”, performed by "Ted" Theodore Logan and Bill S. Preston, Esq., known through all time and the universe as Wyld Stallyns (and featuring Mr. Myles Bacon’s most bodacious guitar licks!) Order the soundtrack now through this futuristic link, and catch Bill & Ted 3 in theaters and various streaming outlets right now. How good is it? Well, read one of many most excellent and non-bogus reviews right here. And remember: Be excellent to each other, and party on, dudes!
Emile Hirsch in “Force of Nature”
FORCE OF NATURE, directed by Michael Polish and starring Mel Gibson, Kate Bosworth and Emile Hirsch is now out on BluRay and VOD, after topping several charts in the first couple of weeks of release. Reminiscent of the high-concept action films of the early 90s, the fast-paced drama portraits a gang of thieves planning a heist during a hurricane, and encountering trouble when a cop tries to force everyone in the building to evacuate. The score is heavily influenced by 90s action scores a la Brad Fiedel and Michael Kamen, and features an orchestra made up of brass, heavy percussion and strings, plus synth sounds from the early digital era. To hear the score, click here.
Kentucker Audley in “Saul At Night”
SAUL AT NIGHT, directed by Cory Santilli and featuring Kentucker Audley and Suzanne Clément, premiered at the Black Nights Film Festival in Tallinn, Estonia. With a mandatory sleep schedule enforced worldwide, one outlier invents new ways to connect with his sleeping family in this inventive, Charlie-Kaufman-like “lo-fi Sci-Fi”. The score features harp (“it’s the most deceptive of all instruments” says director Cory Santilli, and I don’t disagree…), string trio, piano, and electronic sounds. To hear excerpts, click here.