Heather Fenoughty: Ten Tips for Getting into the Composing Game
There is no magic bullet to getting a foot into this industry. Not unless you consider hard work, lots of rejection, or a healthy bent toward self-determination a “magic bullet”. Is there an easy way in? The answer, as with most things in life, is “no”. Most things that are worth doing don’t come easy. However, there are many tried and true methods as well as some proven principles that most of us here at SCO can safely say we’ve built our working careers on. While there would never been enough room to list them all, here are ten things that I’ve learned about getting a foothold and gaining some traction as a composer for film and television.
Read More →Are You Ready?
Before we get too far into this month’s topic of “Getting the Gig,” I just want to ask you, as this weekend’s Provocation, a simple question: Are you ready to get the gig? When I talk to film scoring students, everything we discuss is framed around facilitating their ability to say yes… because just about [...]
Read More →A Simple Question
Many years ago, in another lifetime, I taught creative writing to gifted teenagers for a couple of summers. In each class there were bright, diligent students who just couldn’t find the right turn of phrase. You could feel the mental flailing-about in every paragraph… they were struggling in vain to get to the point. My [...]
Read More →Houston Haynes: Object lesson – what’s *your* take?
I found this listed on a site today – submitted here without comment for your consideration. ________________ HOUSTON HAYNES was born an raised in the southeastern United States, and moved to Los Angeles in 2003 to pursue a career as a composer. You can find his SCORECast bio (and links to his other sites) here.
Read More →The Value of Television Music
As a rule I’m not a fan of cold-water opinion columns. You know the kind: “Here’s the hard, bitter truth about [insert choice of profession here].” The way I see it, more cold water (cold ink?) is simply unnecessary. You know the long hours required to improve, to get your name out there, to advance [...]
Read More →You Need Help… Or Do You?
Composing for picture is a team sport. The first question you have to ask yourself is “Is NOW really the right time for me to hire an assistant?” Hiring an assistant, however, is a process that you should take careful approach to. Here are some things to keep in mind.
Read More →Gateway Scores: West Side Story
When the question came, “What was the score that really pushed you over the edge to get into this field?” I found myself at somewhat of a loss. My gosh, I thought, there are so many, and they all just blur together, I can’t think of any in particular. But no. There is one that [...]
Read More →Gateway Scores: What Got You “Hooked”?
As a special SCOREcast theme for this last week of June, you’ll see several posts on the Main Page covering a topic that we all love to talk about: our love of film music. We asked our SCOREcast Contributors to tell us what film score got them hooked into the idea that scoring films might [...]
Read More →Heather Fenoughty: One-Man-Band
As I approach the big 3-0 (yikes…), and put pen to paper (well, fingers to keyboard) to write this first instalment of my column on this month’s topic of diversification, I’m finding myself reviewing the last 10 years of my career with a resounding “Yes, as a composer it is soooo important to diversify!” Image [...]
Read More →Weekend Provocation
Welcome to the brand-new home of the “Provocations” column. We’re still finding the best schedule for all this content we’re creating on SCOREcast, and it seems like the weekend is a good time for mulling over the kinds of issues we tackle here. Remember, as always, that these provocations aren’t necessarily to be taken literally—they’re [...]
Read More →Diversify or Diversi-die?
The role of “Moving Up the Ladder” is to discuss the aspects of being a “newbie” in the film scoring industry, and to look at the different ways to evolve and shape your career. This month, I’d like to discuss the topic of diversifying at the beginning of your career and whether it is beneficial [...]
Read More →Diverse Collaborators
Most of the time when talking about the topic of “diversification” as film composers, we are referring to the skills necessary to write for a variety of different mediums, genres, or projects. I’d like to talk about diversifying in a different light – being a diverse collaborator. Diverse collaboration to me means that in this [...]
Read More →Translator
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