Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1335892
M OT I O N P I CTU R E S O U N D E D I TO R S I 39 I don't want any composer to ever feel undermined or like I'm nipping at their heels. Quite the contrary, I want them to know that since I'm also a composer, I might have a deeper understanding of the pressures they're under and what they're doing and therefore, I can be a greater asset in helping them be successful. The only times the two mix is when they invite me to do so; I never push to also compose when I'm hired as the music editor. I have had some opportunities to write music when I was hired as the music editor. The first time that happened was when I was music editing Season 1 of Desperate Housewives. Composer Steve Jablonsky had a ton of music to write with little time to write it and so he welcomed any help I could offer, both in terms of tracking cues and on occasion, writing a cue. That was very generous of him. Since then I've had a few jobs where I'm called precisely because I can do both. I spent about 15 years working with Danny Elfman, and on occasion, I would do more than just music edit, but also do some writing. Typically, it was doing re-writes that were necessary due to picture changes. So rather than being limited to just using editorial tools, I would actually change the music before it was recorded. I've also had a few different circumstances where I was brought in as the music editor and ended up writing, too. Back in 2010, I worked on The Losers which was scored by John Ottman, and while playing back reels for producer Joel Silver during the final dub, he decided he wanted to add music in a couple of spots that never had score. After discussing with John, I ended up scoring those scenes on the dub stage—I had a small offline editing room next to the stage, plugged in my keyboard and literally created brand-new music on the stage. Most recently, I was hired to music edit the musical documentary Shawn Mendes: In Wonder. The original idea was to score it using existing music by Ólafur Arnalds, but as we made our way through the film, we found that we were missing about a quarter of the score, where we simply didn't have any material from Ólafur that would work, and the producers asked me if I would compose it. So I got hired as the composer in addition to being the music editor. We worked out a deal and I wrote a dozen new cues over three days including doing multiple versions and tweaks to address their notes until they were happy. I also tracked all of Ólafur's music using stems (or sometimes just stereo mixes) of pieces from his albums, which he provided us. The end result is that the score is by Ólafur Arnalds with additional original music by me, including the main title. 4. PLM: Would you like to talk about a project that presented unique challenges and how you managed through or overcame them? SR: One of my favorite and most challenging projects happened relatively early in my career. Back in 2003, I was hired to help out Carl Kaller (arguably the best music editor I've ever worked with, I learned so much from him) on the temp for 2 Fast 2 Furious, which is where I met John Singleton. John & I really hit it off, and he asked me to do Hustle & Flow, which he was producing. Hustle was challenging in so many ways. One of the biggest challenges of the film was the sound coming out of the little keyboard that Djay plays in the film. When they shot the film, the volume was all the way down so it wouldn't make any noise. I had John send me the actual keyboard from the film, and I created all the sounds that you hear in the film using that keyboard. Whenever Djay was hitting the keys and we could see them, I would match what he was doing, a lot like recoding Foley, and then cut it for a perfect match. I remember the line output from the keyboard didn't work so I had to set up a microphone to record the sound from the built-in speaker. The drum pads and drum loops were all created using sounds the keyboard made, but it was almost never the actual sound that matches the button he presses on camera. I had to help tell the story and using the authentic sound a particular button made wasn't always the best choice in terms of storytelling. There's a scene when Djay comes to Key's house and he starts a beat on the keyboard and sings him some flow. That was shot silent, so I had