Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1541592
M OT I O N P I CTU R E S O U N D E D I TO R S 117 just addressed the scene in different ways. And the whole idea was to help the director weed out what he doesn't like. PL: So, let's shift gears a bit… How does your experience as a composer influence your music editing work? JD: Mostly on the dub stage. What I find today when I'm on projects is that I probably do my best work on the dub stage because so many times, it gets to the point where they've ignored things that aren't really working and now this is it. It's still not working! That's where I can get in there and use my compositional knowledge, my arranging knowledge, and make a cue work. The last project I got hired for, I got hired because the head of the studio had been a producer and I had worked for this person on a couple of films where I did the kind of stuff where on the dub stage if they don't think a cue is working, I can go back and pull out the stems and rebuild it. Then I'm basically acting as a composer; my composer brain is on and I'm reading the scene. I think, "If I can just get some strings here…" "I need this chord… Where can I find this chord? There's that chord! All right. Now, how do I make this line? I need this line to come out here." And you restructure it, and you play it for them, and their mouth falls open. PL: What are some of the different ways you work with composers? Do you help to guide the composer in terms of what the dramatic process should be? JD: Some composers … they got it, man. I don't have to do anything. Some composers have to find their way through trial and error. But again, it comes down to how much do they trust you to bring you into their process? PL: What about if the composer and the director (or powers that be) differ? There's a difference of opinion or there's a little bit of a dispute or they don't feel like the composer's getting it. Can a music editor help that process? JD: Definitely. And the first way I approach it is to make sure they're communicating. The director is saying something to me. My comment is, "Well, did you mention that to the composer?" And I've had it where, "Well, no, but would you?" I'm like, "Okay." Sometimes they feel intimidated because they don't have the musical language. In that case, I usually tell a director to speak to a composer or even to me the way you'd speak to an actor on an emotional level. We know how to interpret that. PL: It's our job to translate… JD: Yeah. So that's my first step. I have a couple of composers I work with where we definitely trust each other, we love each other, we have this creative process where we can speak openly about the creative process and what the film is saying… What do you think of this? What do you think of that? Even to a point where I have a sample library that matches the composers. That way, I can make the changes with MIDI in order to more directly illustrate things. It's more of a composer's assistant job, but because of our relationship, it's an example of how we can work together more effectively. Then when it gets to scoring, we are two people completely on the same page. PL: A united front… JD: It's fantastic that way. I absolutely love that! PL: Let's shift over to your career as a composer and talk about your work with Clint Eastwood on American Sniper. JD: I learned a lot from him mainly in terms of trusting the picture. He was consistently adamant about not wanting a score. And in fact, when I got called about the job, it was the picture editor that called me that said, "Clint doesn't want any underscore in this movie, but we clearly need some." And so, I came in, we looked at a few scenes, and I'm thinking, "Yeah, I get it." They were temping it with some of Clint's music, and a lot of Clint's underscores are atmospheric and droney. It was clear that wasn't enough. They wanted to give me the picture to do some demos. "But does Clint know you're giving me the film?" And they said, "No." I'm like, "Then I don't want it. Don't give me anything." I just mapped out timings and wrote about 10 minutes' worth of music. And I did it like a video game and delivered a bunch of stems. I told them, "If you want Sinfonia I Concert, conducting the Imperial Symphony Orchestra. Photography by Andy Glogower used by permission