10 Lessons on “Breaking In”

I often get asked for a checklist of things one can do to break in to the business. Here is my personal “top ten” of lessons learned.

Worst Advice for Beginning Composers

When you are starting out, everyone has an opinion. And here’s mine.

SCOREcast 26: Getting the Gig

For our first show of 2010, recording engineer, composer, and SCOREcast contributing editor Randy Knaub fills in at the co-hosting chair for Lee Sanders. Deane and Randy give their Top Gear picks from their trip to the 2010 Winter NAMM Show, and follow up on January’s “Getting the Gig” discussions with their own insights. They also give us a sneak preview of what’s to come in February — a focus on “Competition” during annual awards season.

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.

The “Gigs” Don’t Exist

I have dinner every couple of months with a great group of working television composers. Part strategic network, part support group, our times together are always amazing and I’ve never not come away with either some juicy info on a cool new compositional technique or a great new way to implement some sort of hardware or software tool. Composers often get pegged for some of our antisocial behavior, but when these 20 or so composers get together, the discussion and conversation flow can be endless, and these social gatherings often drag into the wee hours of the next morning. At the latest of these dinners this last weekend, I became engaged in a conversation about…

How to Get onto the Playing Field

For many of you reading SCOREcast, writing music is not a full-time job. You’d like it to be, but you just don’t land enough gigs (yet). In fact, you’re not even sure how to get yourself into the pool of available candidates for enough gigs, often enough, to make it a full-time profession. Read on for some ideas and a little perspective. First off, some ideas. One day you’re toiling away, cheerfully losing money and hustling your ass off… constantly looking for ways to “plus the show” of your own musical endeavors while working a separate job (or two or three) to pay the bills. It’s taking a toll on your energy level, but you’re…

Getting Gigs: Balancing Your Worth With Your Wishes

Tell me if this scenario sounds familiar to you. A filmmaker approaches you about a gig, and really wants you for the job. In your excitement, you talk through the particulars and get all of the information that you can… except for the money part. The conversation continues until, finally, there is nothing left to talk about EXCEPT for the money part, and now you are in that awkward position of doing the asking… since nobody is freely offering. We’ve all heard the old saying in our profession, usually in the context of speaking to someone about a possible project: “Fast, cheap, or good. Pick two!” To be honest, I’m not sure where this adage…

POLL: Getting the Gig

Wake up, shower, coffee, power up, check your vitals, relisten to last night’s unfinished cue, try to get back into it, struggle, struggle some more, finally break through, smile, remember to eat something (maybe!), stretch, deal with some phone calls, write some more, “Oh my God, it’s midnight already!”, fix that thing in your template that’s been bugging you, work some more, give up, go to bed, sleep for three hours, do it all again. Sound familiar? With the myriad things going on in your studio, when would you ever have time to network, email, stay in touch, and just generally mine for other gigs? Not to mention cutting demos, researching new opportunities, and all…

Kamen’s Law and Your Attitude

It’s no secret that 2009 was a slow year for a ton of people. Coming off the slump that the world economy has been in for the last two years, for many facets of the entertainment biz, things couldn’t get much worse. As we’ve wrapped up this last year, I have heard numerous sighs of relief, seen many puffed up cheeks of exhaustion, and felt the overwhelming dark cloud of “what now?” on Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter. Generally, it seems that most of us are perfectly happy to blow a kiss goodbye to the last decade and get on with this new one that, just like that, is suddenly upon us. As we focus on…

How to NOT Compose for Television

It is pretty daunting to look at the TV landscape and the people who are already involved with scoring for television and ask yourself: How in the hell am I ever going to get a shot? So many shows are in production, not to mention the fact that television is not just about the “regular season” anymore — it’s about a fragmented “season” that now runs year-round. The big networks are now starting to show the signs of a marathon runner trying desperately to keep up with the young bucks that are also on the course. These “youngins” are starting to become directly responsible for some of the best drama and comedy on television, with…

Gateway Scores: Men in Black

When Jai asked us to write a Blog this week on the score that got us into the business, or at least opened our eyes to the industry, I was reminded of something I was once told in an interview I had done with a composer called Andrew Sigler. I keep coming back to this time and time again, as I think Andrew really hit the nail on the head: “…I always wonder if [people] confuse their influences with their favorite composers, which are not always the same thing. I’ll put it this way, influences run more deeply and subconsciously than ‘my fave five’ composers. For instance, I love Stravinsky. And I love to say…

Jim Well: The Journey

This monthly column, Inside The Outside, takes you inside one man’s ongoing journey to a composing career. I’ll be thinking out loud about challenges as they hit. I can’t say for sure I’ll arrive intact. But if you’re a fellow traveler, we’ll confront the same demons. May The Farce be with us. “Who is this Jim Well guy?” you wonder. I didn’t start out to be a composer. As a kid, I longed to be a music guy. Dad said, “Son, be an engineer instead. Do music on the side.” Taking his advice, I went to the Dark Side, while Muse took a nap. Can’t say I regret my eons as an engineer. It put…