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Sonic Branding Wachtler says 615 provided the show with several different ideas, knowing that they were probably competing with other music houses for the job. “In this particular case, I think we gave them three different ideas and they really liked this idea. We went back and tweaked it a bit. They approved it, and we tweaked the lyrics a little bit more. Once we got the lyrics ap- proved, we went in with the mu- sicians and recorded.” Clients that come to 615 Music looking for an original piece, such as the one used for A session at 615 Music featuring (L-R) engineer Aaron Gant, composer Dale Oliver, and vocalist Kenley Shea. caught up in personal opinions.“As soon as someone says, ‘I don’t like that,’ we say,‘How does it relate to the themes we talked about: relationships, tempo? Are we hitting the marks on this? [It’s not about] whether you like it or not.’” ORIGINAL OPTIONS, MORE At press time, Nashville’s 615 Music (www.615music.com) had just gotten word that its work for The Today Show was nomi- nated for a national Daytime Emmy. The music provider — which offers original composition, as well as a 23-volume cata- Today, represent 30 to 40 percent of the company’s business, and that number is down a bit, says Wachtler, because of the struggles with the economy. “It’s obviously more expensive to do these original songs,” he notes,“and to do them with the care we do these things. It does take some time to really do it right and therefore costs a little bit more.” For clients on a tighter budget, 615 Music offers its music library as an option. “Those get used a lot more because they are much more affordable,” says Wachtler. “But these original songs are very popular, tional instrumentation from the region in the music.They wanted it to sound worldly.” Using Pro Tools|HD, 615 created around a dozen main cues,which were then edited into literally hundreds of different versions.The music uses orchestral instruments to achieve a rich, full sound, along with some more mod- ern percussive elements. THEMATIC DEVELOPMENT Erik Blicker, who’s a partner at Manhat- tan’s G&E Music (www.gemusic.com) with Glen Schloss, says all of the studio’s work serves some sort of branding purpose, be it for a long-form project or a spot. “When you are scoring a film, you are finding a voice for the entire film,” says Blicker. “[With] all great music, there’s al- ways thematic ideas that are the root of everything.Then you develop those the- matic ideas when you are composing.The same goes for sonic branding.You come up with a theme and develop it.You are always thinking about branding, you are always thinking about a voice, you are always thinking about thematic development when you are composing.” G&E recently created a complete re- brand for the French history channel, His- toire (www.histoire.fr). The channel, says Blicker, never really had a musical identity, so logue with more than 40,000 tracks — cre- ated an original, high-energy song that’s fea- tured on Today. “Your Day Is Today” has the catchy-ness of a pop hit. It was developed over a three- week period and was recorded at 615’s Music Row studio.“We’ve had relationship with The Today Show for eight to 10 years,” ex- plains 615 Music’s president/CEO Randy Wachtler.“We’ve done quite a few instru- mentals and songs over the years.This last one, they came up with the title.They wanted a song called ‘Your Day Is Today,’ and the di- rection of where they wanted to go, and we came back and started writing a song.” 30 Post • June 2010 G&E Music created an audio rebrand for the French history channel, Histoire. Graphics were created by CA Square in New York City. and the bigger clients like them and can af- ford them.” 615 Music also sees a lot of success creating news packages for stations around the world.The company recently created the sonic brand for China CCTV, a govern- ment-run network that covers a little bit of everything. “They came to us, and they really like how the western channels have been able to establish really strong brands,” says Wachtler.“They also didn’t want any tradi- www.postmagazine.com the team asked the client a lot of questions to get some direction. “We did a mnemonic exploration, where we came up with 30 different mnemonics to try to find the voice or sound of the sta- tion,” explains Blicker.“We found [a] sound and interwove it into block opens and show opens and promos. Basically, the entire sound of the channel. Schloss says G&E started off in a music continued on page 45