A couple of weeks ago I had the pleasure to meet and interview John O’Hara, amazing composer and member of Ian Anderson’s Jethro Tull.
Here’s the video interview (intro in Italian, questions and answers in English).
Hope you enjoy it !
Photo by Stefano Angeletti
My Interview with Richard Buxton www.tracksounds.com
https://www.facebook.com/Tracksounds/posts/10153417578304845:0
Cinematic Freedom: An Interview with Kristian Sensini
Kristian Sensini is an Italian film composer, who specializes in animation, drama, fantasy, and documentaries. Kristian studied at the Conservatorio Statale di Musica “Gioachino Rossini”. Kristian joined Tracksounds to discuss his diverse musical background, his time working with a master of orchestration, and being selected as Latvia’s entry into the Best Foreign Language Film category at the 2015 Academy Awards.
Interview by Richard Buxton.
RB – How did you first become involved in film scoring?
Kristian Sensini – When I was young I had a big vinyl collection of themes from TV series and cartoons of the early eighties, and I remember I was especially interested in the music of Scott Bradley and Carl Stalling – every time I watched cartoons I would record the music from the TV speakers, I still have the cassette tapes somewhere. So I guess it was a matter of time, I’m really keen on movies, and people always told me that my music had a “cinematic” taste. Let’s say that one of the purposes of my compositions is – and always has been– to tell a story.
RB – You have a wide-ranging musical experience, having been a member of several rock bands and the DAMS Jazz orchestra, as well as being one of Italy’s foremost Jazz Flutists. How has you varied background helped you in your scoring career?
KS – I’m a curious person by nature, and I’m always interested in exploring new musical territories: this helped me a lot to immerse myself in various projects. In the show business there’s this tendency to classify a composer by genre, like this one is for horror movies, this other one for thrillers and so on. I try to get involved in different projects because it’s exciting to experience what your creativity can do in a new setting. I’ve studied both classical composition and jazz and I’ve always had a passion for classic rock, and these influences are mixed in my musical subconscious and led me to find my unique voice as composer. Also, the improvisation aspect of jazz music is really helpful when you have a short deadline and you just can’t wait for the inspiration to come: improvising melodies in front of different audiences night after night has been an amazing training over the years. By the way, I’ve never composed a “jazzy” score but it is a perspective I’ve used in all of my classical scores.
RB – What is something that you enjoy about film scoring that can’t be found anywhere else in music?
KS – The strange mix of freedom and respect for the tradition. In film scoring you can really push the limits of experimentation in terms of melody, harmony, rhythm and orchestration and the audience accepts this, it’s really open to new things. In pop, rock and jazz music this aspect appears to be lost, everything is so mainstream now, in my opinion. On the other hand, film music respects hundreds of years of classical tradition and is played by real musicians or… well it should!
RB – Can you describe your studio setup?
KS – It’s really simple, I use a Windows based workstation (with double monitors) where I load both my Daw (I’ve been a Cubase User for 20 years now) and my sample libraries, most of them are Native Instruments, 8dio, Sonokinetik and I’ve been fascinated by the Spitfire ones more recently. I try to involve real musicians as much as I can (and as much as the movie budget allows it), and when I choose sample-based instruments I write music in a way that goes beyond the limits of real ones: I don’t want to fake an orchestra (it would be silly), it’s another way to express my ideas.
I have a NordStage 2 as master Keyboard, sometimes I use some of his internal presets too, they sound better than a lot of Vst out there. Add to this setup a lot of acoustic instruments that I usually play myself (really bad, but that’s a lot of fun) and there it is.
RB – One of your latest projects is the Latvian film Rocks In My Pockets. How did you find yourself joining the project?
KS – By chance, as it always happens in our business. I was interested in writing music for an animation feature and I wrote dozens of emails to animators and directors I appreciate; one of them (Bill Plympton) gave my email address to Signe Baumane (the director of Rocks In My Pockets) because she actually was in post–production and was searching for a composer to take care of the music of her first feature movie.
RB – How did you approach the score? What were your immediate thoughts and ideas as you began work on the project?
KS – My first idea was to keep the score really intimate with a really small orchestration, because there’s a voiceover from the very beginning until the very end of the movie. So I assembled a palette of sounds that could be intimate and could express at the same time all the various feelings of this movie. My main choice was the cello, an instrument I love, along with piano and flute (which I’ve personally recorded in the score). I’ve then added a clarinet and a kokle (a string instrument of the Latvian musical tradition where part of the movie is set) to give a sort of ethnic flavor to some specific cues. This palette of instruments was my starting point in order to compose the first cues, following the chronological order of the movie, as I wanted to follow the same journey of the audience.
RB – In recent years, filmmakers have utilized animation to tell serious and mature stories, where in the past animation has often been seen as a visual medium mainly for younger audiences. In what ways do you think this film’s story could only be told as an animation, and how did it being animated affect your score?
KS – Animation should be considered “just” a medium and not a genre: nowadays people still think “It’s a cartoon, it’s something for kids” (check the animation movies nominated for the Academy Awards in recent years). Probably thanks to the internet now adult animation movies are reaching bigger and more mature audiences but they still have a long way to go. To quote the director’s words: “Animation has a toolbox that live-action films could only dream to have, like using metaphors as shortcuts to deeper meaning of a character’s state of mind or feelings.” When I score an animation project (unless it is a cartoon deliberately intended for a young audience) I tend to forget the medium and focus on the story and on the characters, as it were a real-action film. I think that in the case of Rocks In My Pockets, the changes in tone allowed me to work with a big palette of feelings and write very serious cues and some wittier, even amusing ones.
RB – What are some of the main differences between scoring animated films and live-action films?
KS – The people working on them, definitely. I love the people who work in animation, they tend to be more original and they still consider animation a work of art more than a business. They are very committed professionals, you have to be if you think how many hours of work you need just to complete a short animation movie of 3 minutes.
RB – Rocks In My Pockets was chosen as Latvia’s entry into the Best Foreign Language Film category at the Academy Awards. When working on your score for the film, were you at all aware that it might be in the running for a possible entry into the Academy Awards?
KS – Absolutely not! And I’m happy about this because in this way I worked with no pressures of any kind, with lots of artistic freedom, with the only purpose of delivering the best score I could to help the story unfold. When you work on a movie which has potential Oscar
buzz (even if it is not finished yet…) you have this huge sword of Damocles over your head that really doesn’t benefit creativity, you’re always searching for a way to obtain consent from the potential voters.
RB – Along with this Oscar buzz and a nomination for best score at the Jerry Goldsmith Film Music awards, you must be gaining more exposure as a composer. What are some of your aspirations in film scoring?
KS – To keep working with independent filmmakers, the ones with original projects, the ones that believe that filmmaking is meant to describe our world to future generations. If you work on projects like these, at the end of the day you know you’ve done something that is worth to be shared, and this is the kind of idea which keeps me going when I’m tired after hours and hours of work in the studio.
RB – You recently studied under renowned composer and orchestrator Conrad Pope. What are some things that you learnt from him?
KS – I had the privilege to study with Maestro Pope last summer in Wien at the Hollywood Music Workshop. Pope is a great musician and an amazing teacher, very generous and really devoted to share his art and his experience with the new generation of composers and orchestrators. I’ve got pages and pages of precious suggestions in my notebook, but the ones that influenced me more are the respect for the symphonic tradition, the importance of the written note (yes, we’re talking about pencil and paper) and the idea that when you write music you write something for a musician and not for an instrument. Pope is a great expert of the modern scoring process and all the new technologies but after the short period I studied with him I felt the urgency to write more music in a traditional way. Composers nowadays have to keep the pace with directors and producers who want to hear mockups of the scores, so they need to do everything in a crazy hurry, and they end up becoming more music players than music writers.
RB – Which composers or scores have had a major influence on your scoring career?
KS – John Williams (and his scores for E.T., Star Wars, Indiana Jones) is the one that instilled in me the idea that music in film is something more than a nice background, it is a subtext, a meta-language. Then of course other great Italian composers like Nino Rota, Armando Trovajoli and Ennio Morricone (I’ve studied with him at the National School of Cinema in Rome), not to mention Bernard Hermann.
RB – Can you share any details about any upcoming projects?
KS – I’m working on a couple of new projects but I can’t talk about them right now, the risk of being fired or replaced is always just around the corner in the movie business! I can tell you that, in the meantime, I’m working on a personal project, a series of compositions for a string quartet: I hope I find the time to record them soon, as it is a project I’ve put on hold for too many years now.
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This interview took place in January 2015.
Rocks in My Pockets Trailer & Selected Scenes:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUsZwB70msg
The Rocks in my Pockets official score is available for purchase now:
Amazon: http://amzn.to/1IbfPaN
ITunes: http://apple.co/1DcBhiU
Twitter: https://twitter.com/kristiansensini
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kristiansensini
Tell us a little about yourself and how did you get into scoring for films?
I’m a cinephile and I have a true passion for movies and storytelling. I was lucky enough to grow up in the eighties, a great decade for movies for young audience, with amazing orchestral scores (think about Star Wars, Back To The Future, The Goonies and so on…). I have written music since I was very young and even when I was pursuing a career as a jazz musician people kept telling me that my music had visual qualities, and could be good music for images. As a matter of fact my inspiration, even when I write music not attached to any movie, usually comes from images or stories. So I guess that writing music for movies was sort of my destiny.
What is your usual process for creating audio content for different media?
It’s always different, depending on each project. I usually try and immerse myself in the world of the specific project I’m working on, I do musical and technical researches on instruments in order to create a unique palette of sounds that I think can be good and original. Then I cross my fingers and hope for inspiration to come… and I’m often very lucky.
How did you get involved with “Rocks In My Pockets”?
I was searching for animation projects to score and I had contacted Bill Plympton, a well know director and animator. He’s a friend of Signe Baumane’s (director of “Rocks in my Pockets”) and suggested she contact me to score her debut feature movie. She did and it all worked out.
How long did it take you to score “Rocks In My Pockets”?
It took about three weeks to score this film. That was the deadline to submit the movie to some major festivals.
What would you consider to be your favorite track to score in “Rocks In My Pockets”?
Probably “Anna’s Theme”, which became the main theme of the movie. It is a rather simple track, a bouncy waltz, funny but at the same time a melancholic tune. At first, when I was trying to find a tune for Anna’s character, it was coming out really sad and melancholic (I was probably influenced by the Beatles’ song “She’s Leaving Home”, as in the movie we have this story of a young girl who left her home). The director then showed me another point of view, that this girl leaves her home and family to start an amazing adventure, that is to say the discovery of her adult life. So I trashed the old cue and started from scratch, and the result was so good that “Anna’s Theme” became a reoccurring melody in the movie, even in the end titles.
You have mostly scored films. If you were to score a television show, what would be your ideal show?
Great question! Probably something like “Black Mirror”, “Utopia” or “Twilight Zone”, projects where you can use different musical approaches and even a bit of humor here and there.
Your first project you scored was “The Mongol King” in 2005. How do you think your work has changed since that project?
I think I’m maybe more conscious of what I’m doing. I’ve built a workflow that helps me save time and stay focused on the projects I’m working on at the time. Hopefully I’ve developed a personal voice as a composer.
Any specific “lessons learned” on a project that you could share?
Every project is a lesson, because working for film is an intimate and collaborative experience between artists, you share ideas, feelings, and you correlate with other people’s lives. I love this job because there’s something to learn on every project. The greatest lesson I’ve learned is that the best thing is to be honest with yourself and your music, while trying not to imitate any other composer (something that people do all the time for the desire to find an easy consent). This way, in the end, you know that your time is well spent because you’ve created something new and original.
If your budget was endless for “Rocks In My Pockets”, what would you have done different musically?
Nothing, from a creative point of view. Monetary wise, maybe I would have recorded in London, at Abbey Road, just for the pleasure of working there for a couple of days.
Any tips, hints or motivational speeches for the readers?
Be original, the world needs new beautiful music, not something “already heard” elsewhere. Try to push yourself to experiment as much as possible and be brave to defend your ideas and your musical identity. Also, pray that you find a good director who loves your music and believes in you as much as you do.
New interview about the soundtrack I wrote for Rocks In My Pockets this time for the cool guys at Agents of Geek
http://agentsofgeek.com/2014/12/composer-kristian-sensini-talks-rocks-in-my-pockets/
We recently had the chance to interview composer Kristian Sensini about his new project Rocks In My Pockets. The film is currrently an early contendor for Latvia’s Best Foreign Language Film for the 87th Annual Academy Awards.
Directed and written by Latvian animator Signe Baumane, Rocks in My Pockets focuses on how Baumane and five women in her family handle depression. Their stories are told with visual metaphors and surreal images. Keep reading to learn about Sensini’s scoring style and experiences while working on Rocks in My Pockets.
Rocks In My Pockets is getting a lot of potential Oscar buzz, what do you think about this?
It’s amazing, of course! It’s one of the 84 movies running for Best Foreign Film and at the same time also one of the 20 movies selected for the Best Animation category, and the Academy has just announced that the soundtrack has been included in the 114 scores in contention for the prize. As an animation movie, Rocks in my Pockets is running with giants like Disney and Dreamworks movies with a big budget (and scores with big orchestras). It’s sort of funny to see our little independent movie compete with them, but after all I really think that Rocks in my Pockets does deserve this kind of recognition. It’s a traditional animation movie, entirely hand-drawn (no CGI or computer images were used) and hand-made (just like the soundtrack). It’s a brave point of view on a really serious topic, depression and mental illness.
What was the hardest part about scoring Rocks In My Pockets?
The director’s voiceover (a great interpretation of hers) is present from start to finish, so the difficult thing in this case was trying to compose music on frequencies that wouldn’t disturb the sound of her voice. Another obstacle was using themes/orchestration in order to enhance the storytelling without distracting the audience.
Where did you get the inspiration for the tone of this soundtrack?
I got inspiration for this soundtrack from the stunning visuals and voiceover acting of the director. A “Funny Film about Depression”, is quite an impossible mission in itself, and the risk of a bad musical choice was just around the corner… For example, the use of a tone too light or “cartoony” in the most amusing scenes and the over scoring on dramatic ones could have led to disaster. I let the voice guide me in finding the right tone in each cue, seeing it as the main melody, so I had to underscore that with various countermelodies.
There is many dramatic scenes in Rocks In My Pockets, but the score makes it feel a little lighter at times. Was this intentional?
Yes, it was intentional. This is the whole point of the movie, not making a joke out of such a serious topic, but trying to explain that depression and mental illness could be considered a part of life. Maybe something we do not want to celebrate, but something we can deal with and that can even help us understand other’s issues and struggles. This film has a brave and amazing view on life, and I think it’s really original and something worth sharing. Life itself has the equal combination of light and darkness and everything contributes to our growth as human beings. It’s exactly what I want to express with my music (and not just in this movie).
This is one of your first animated films, is it a lot different than scoring live action?
I’ll never stop saying that animation filmmakers are amazing. They’re usually so imaginative and so caring about their projects, at times more than other directors. When you work on an animated project you feel you are part of a family. From a musical point of view, you may have a little bit more freedom to experiment with new ideas, but it really depends on the director and movie. I’ve tried to score this movie as it was live action in some parts: somehow knowing that it was a true story and that the characters were real people was more predominant than the fact that the visual medium was animation.
What direction did the director, Signe Baumane give you when you initially started? Meaning what was the main goal for her in terms of the soundtrack?
One of the first things we did when we started thinking about the score was to have a brainstorming session about past soundtracks we really enjoyed. I remember in our first phone call, we talked about the soundtrack for Sherlock Holmes by Hans Zimmer, and found that it was one of our favourites because it was so creative and has a really innovative use of orchestration and instruments. We agreed we wanted to keep it a “small” orchestration and use instruments in an original way. We also decided to have something ethnic in the score, hence the inclusion of the Kokle (a beautiful string instrument from the Latvian tradition) because part of the movie is set in Latvia. The main goal was to lead the audience by hand into this beautiful story, and help their immersion in the movie in a good way.
There is a lot of the piano in this score. Is that your go to instrument? If not, what do you find yourself playing reoccurring in your film scores?
Flute and piano are my two main instruments. They are the ones I usually record myself in the projects I score. The piano is the instrument on which I compose a lot, it is so rich that it helps one imagine the sound of a full orchestra or of different orchestral sections. I tend not to use an instrument in a score just because I like it, unless it is strictly necessary to the movie. In this case, I thought the piano was the best choice to help fix the harmony and for one of the main themes, “Anna’s Theme”. Recently, I realized I have used a lot of cello in my previous scores, it is such a beautiful instrument and can be really useful in a lot of different situations.
Who is your favourite character in the film?
Irbe, probably because she is a musician like myself. I wrote one of my favourite cues in this film for her.
When you found out you got the job of scoring this film, how long did you have to experiment with instruments/sounds before you actually had to start?
I usually try to do my research and to experiment with sounds before I sign any contract. To me it is really important to present a demo (usually more than one) to the director which expresses both my point of view on the film and the result of my research. So for about four or five days I researched Latvian and Eastern Europe music because I felt that in terms of feelings and orchestration this sound was the right one. I listened to different kinds of music from different centuries, classical composers, film composers and popular music too. Then I composed two demos for two different scenes and I got the job.
This film is highly musical. How many minutes did you end of scoring?
More than an hour of music!
What would you like viewers to take away from the film?
You should ask Signe Baumane (the director) about this, I’ll just give you my humble opinion.
I think this film is a great start for “global conversations” about the things that scare us, in this particular case depression and mental illness. We live in a global society where we think that medication can solve anything and cure any illness. To me, this is a way of seeing the reality too easy and naive. The real deal is taking the journey of your life, questioning ourselves about who we are and especially who we want to be or become, without forgetting that life is full of light and darkness all at the very same time.
Listen to an album preview below:
Read more at http://agentsofgeek.com/2014/12/composer-kristian-sensini-talks-rocks-in-my-pockets/#J17ROvWwTQcJFAlW.99
In Spring 2013, Award-winning film composer Kristian Sensini dove into a challenging project that was equal parts light and dark. A year later, “Rocks in My Pockets,” is now considered a critically-acclaimed animated feature and Latvia’s entry for “Best Foreign Language” at the upcoming 2015 Academy Awards.
Musically, the film’s soundtrack delivers the appropriate amount of melancholic and uplifting themes for Signe Baumane’s passion project. In short, the score left viewers enthralled for 88 minutes. The New York-based Latvian animator wrote and directed “Rocks in My Pockets,” which was released on Sept. 3, 2014 by Zeitgeist Films and can next be seen at the Palm Springs International Film Festival in January. The film is a personal story on how she and five women in her family handle their battles with madness.
In this interview, Sensini talks about his process, his inspirations and what he looks for in a project. More of his work can be heard in “The Becoming,” “7 Giorni della Fine del Mondo,” “Brightside,” “Hyde’s Secret Nightmare,” and many more.
How did you get involved with “Rocks in My Pockets”?
KS: By chance, as it often happens… I had got in contact with the director Bill Plympton so that he could listen to some of my works, and Signe – Plympton’s friend and collaborator – was looking for a composer for her first animated feature film. After exchanging a few e-mail messages, I prepared some mock-ups for two scenes of the movie, she liked them… and I immediately started working on it.
Was it difficult to find a tone for the music after viewing the film?
KS: It was a deep overwhelming emotional experience just watching it, so I had to find the right balance between the various tones of the film: it’s an animation movie for adults, very funny in some parts and very dark and down-to-the-earth in others. I didn’t want to see it just as an animation project, constantly taking into account that behind every single character there was a really rich and complicated life and, in some cases, a sad and horrible death. At the same time I had to lighten the weight of some scenes, but not too much, because Signe was really brave and not at all afraid of having some scenes scored in a really dramatic way.
What was the most difficult thing that you encountered as a composer on this project?
KS: This is a real story AND actually the story of Signe’s family, so at first I was worried about ruining everything. It’s the same feeling you have when you’re invited to a family dinner and you don’t know anyone, and you’re scared of saying and doing the wrong thing in the wrong moment. But this was a special family and Signe was so friendly that I immediately sympathized with her and I feel extremely proud that she wanted to share her story with me; I loved all the characters and, in the end, it was like… sitting at lunch with MY family, where you’re allowed to talk about everything and even to joke about pretty serious topics as mental illness, suicide and depression.
On a more “practical” level, the most difficult thing was trying to create a musical presence that was a sort of companion to the voiceover. The whole movie is narrated by Signe’s voice that acts as a counterpoint to the beautiful drawings. This detail was an essential part in the composition and orchestration process, as we together chose and carefully selected the instruments that could better create a musical background to the voice without distracting the viewer from the narration itself.
What was your favorite scene to score?
KS: Probably the cue about Irbe (if you’ve watched the movie it’s a very delicate and touching moment in the movie): she was a young and promising musician, and I guess I feel somewhat connected to her character. “Irbe’s theme” is in fact a beautiful and melancholic piece.
Did you find yourself using one instrument more than others when creating this score?
KS: Yes, the cello plays an important role in this movie, actually. I’ve used it a lot, mainly as a melodic instrument but also in harmonies and rhythm patterns. I just love the warm sound of the cello and I thought (the director as well) that it was the perfect sound to use in this movie: it doesn’t fight with the frequencies of the voiceover and can be really dramatic in a scene and really quirky in the very next one. It’s the “Jack of all trades” instrument of this soundtrack!
The film is getting a lot of potential Oscar buzz, are you surprised at this?
KS: Well… Let’s say that I was surprised to read the title of a movie I’ve worked on in the same sentence of the words “Academy Awards”, it certainly is something that doesn’t happen every day! Other than that, I’m not that surprised because Rocks in my Pockets is a great movie, extremely honest and well crafted, not to mention that it is pure storytelling and adventure, exactly what a movie should be. I hope that the Members of the Academy will recognize this big little work of art, it’s something different from the usual animation movies.
What was your working relationship like with the director, Signe Baumane, since you are not located in the same country?
KS: Everything was perfect. As we kept in contact using the email and Skype, we had to consider the different time-zones, and this allowed me to work in my studio and send the daily cues to New York by mail at the end of the day and go to sleep; the morning after I would receive Signe’s feedback, be able to make adjustments and send them back. It was really smooth! When I was sleeping Signe was working and vice versa, but there were times when both of us were working! It’s a really clever solution, and that’s one of the reasons why I like so much to work on overseas projects.
Did you give each character special themes? If so, which was your favorite character to score for?
KS: Yes, every character has his or her specific theme, it was a chance I didn’t wanted to miss. Nowadays, soundtracks are so buried and hidden in the mix that music has become a sort of sonic wallpaper, really inconsistent. What you hear is “pads” and soundscapes, you can’t catch a single melody when you are out of the theatre. I love the soundtracks that can live a life out of the movies (as Morricone taught me). My favorite theme is “Anna’s Theme”, because she is a great character, really complex. At first I had some trouble finding the right theme for her, I needed something that was joyful, uplifting and dramatic at the same time… a real challenge. In the end it worked so well that I’ve used it extensively all over the movie, in little cues with different arrangements (for solo piano, for two instruments and so on). At the very end of the movie you can listen to the full track with orchestral arrangements. Some critics wrote that this piece reminds a little of the works Nino Rota composed for Fellini, and I’m very proud of this… of course.
You have sc
ored a lot of horror films in the past and the genre for this film is very different. Where did you get the inspiration for the tone for this film?
KS: When I score a movie my focus is on the characters and the story, so I really don’t worry about the genre of the movie. If there’s a great story to tell and it is written well then it’s something that I’m interested in working on. That being said, the inspiration comes directly from the beautiful images Signe drew and from her way to tell the story. The voice-over you hear in the movie was recorded by Signe herself, so it was easy to connect to such a personal and deep story, as the anecdotes narrated are the stories of Signe’s family and her personal fight against depression.
Which composer would you say has the most influence on your music?
KS: John Williams. He is the main reason I got interested in film music. Then, Bernard Herrmann and Nino Rota, to follow.
Is there a genre that you would love to work in film scoring, which would it be?
KS: Anything which has a good script and is a work of art. We are in this world to learn lessons and feel emotions, so I’d choose everything with a good and clever storytelling. Also, I hope to find more animation movies to work on in the future, the people involved in this genre are the best, they’re great and imaginative artists who work for years on a single project and really care about it.
What is your favorite film that you’ve scored so far in your career?
KS: “Rocks in my Pockets”, no doubt about it.
If a project came along that you would get really excited about, what would it be?
KS: As member of the audience I’m really excited about the upcoming “Peanuts” movie (even more than Star Wars VII and I’m a HUGE SW nerd). Talking about my contribution as composer to a potential project, I would be excited to work on a good biopic (the story of Nikola Tesla could be a great one) like “The Imitation Game” or any sort of historical movie.
Are you currently working on any projects?
KS: I’m working on a couple of interesting projects and pitching some others but I really can’t tell you which ones, I’m really superstitious and each time I’ve talked about an upcoming project in an interview, well… it didn’t end well! I’ve had my amount of rejected scores as each and every film composer on Earth (except for John Williams, clearly).
Very special thanks to Kristian for being so gracious with his time for doing this interview together and let’s do it again after you win and Oscar! Also very special thanks go to Jordan Von Netzer for the major assist on this one. I definitely owe you one!
The soundtrack to “Rocks In My Pockets” is available from MovieScore Media on iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/rocks-in-my-pockets-original/id923017808
KRISTIAN SENSINI BIO
“Composer for film specializing in Thriller, Drama, Fantasy and Documentary. He is a Piano and Flute player with Classical and Jazz Background studies, with credits for Movies in Italy and USA. His music is present in the best Music Library worldwide specialized in movie music (credits Rai and Mediaset, the biggest Television Network in Italy). From 2010 Sensini received a total of 9 Nominees for Best Score (categories Feature Film, Documentaries, Promotion, Best Song, Best Short) at the Jerry Goldsmith International Film Music Award.
In 2013 he won the Global Music Award for the soundtrack of the horror movie “Hyde’s Secret Nightmare” Sensini studied at Conservatory “G. Rossini” (Italy) composition, arrangements, piano and classical flute. He’s attended Master classes and Composition Workshops with Ennio Morricone, Ludovic Bource, Nicola Piovani, Michael Giacchino, Bruno Coulais, Abel Korzeniowski, Murray Gold, Nathan Barr, Dave Grusin and Christopher Lennertz.
He also studied Orchestration and Composition with Conrad Pope, orchestrator for John Williams, Howard Shore, Alexandre Desplat, Alan Silvestri.”
Here’s the interview done for the website http://www.musiccomposerblog.com/
What is your studio setup like? What do you use for recording piano?
-I have a hybrid setup, half virtual instruments and half real ones. I am myself a piano and flute player and in my studio I have a grandpiano, so basically this two instruments are recorded live. If the budget allows me to have other musicians, I usually record live with some soloists like guitars, cello and violin. On the “virtual” side of it, I use Cubase, installed on a Windows 64bit based workstation. As for sample libraries, I use Symphobia and Orchestral Essentials by Project Sam for orchestral ensembles, Komplete 8 by Native Instruments, 8diotaiko Drums and Voices, Requiem Light by Soundiron for choirs, various Vir2 Instruments like Q or Mojo Brass, Best Services libraries for ethnic sounds like voices and percussions, Spectrasonic’s Omnisphere and Trillian for synth an basses. To record the piano I use a babygrand Challen piano, and if I need a quick digital sketch I use Ivory or the pianos avalaible on Komplete 8.
How have you seen the business of composing change during your career? Where is the industry headed?
-The business has changed in some ways. First of all, the Internet has become an amazing way to keep in touch with directors and projects worldwide. This means that I can write and record a full soundtrack in my little studio in Italy, eventually make additional recording with musicians from anywhere in the world, and get the soundtrack delivered to the director or the producer the very next day . The other side of the coin is that technology gives everyone the chance to play with music… but the real work is something else. Some people act as composers, download and crack softwares and samples illegally and accept to work for movie projects for free. This kills the busines, and especially the Art itself. I hope young directors will learn to recognize art from hobby, and to judge quality in music.
What composers or artists inspire you? What artists have influenced your piano works?
-I’m inspired not only by other musicians but by any form of art, books, movies and paintings. I love Boudelaire, Dalí and Magritte for example, they are an amazing inspiration. Talking about music, I have to mention Stravinskij and Bartok, Dvorak and Ravel, Debussy and Satie. In the film music field, the composers of the Golden Age, then North, Herrmann, Mancini, Kornald. And I must add Goldsmith and Williams… and Giacchino and Elfman. Talking about piano, I’m totally in love with the piano works of some jazz pianists such as Bill Evans and Stefano Bollani (in my opinion, one of the greatest piano players in activity now).
What genres and sounds are most comfortable – and what styles are you still learning to master as a composer?
I really love to compose for small ensembles: they have a more intimate sound and the fact of having less sound combinations drives me to experiment more. Limits are a great thing to develop creativity.
I have had on hold, for about two years now, an album for piano and other chamber instruments, music which sounds like film music but that is unlinked from any audiovisual project. I like to work especially for documentaries, horror and drama movies. As a film composer, I’m costantly studying orchestration and new ways to make melodies and variations grow, I’m experimenting writing music for animations and comedies as well, as far as I’m concerned the most difficult genre to score.
Can you recommend any pieces that are essential for every composer to dissect?
Everything Stravinskij, everything Bartok, Beethoven’s string quartets, Gil Evans and Duke Ellington’s arrangements… this could be a good start.
Do you have any projects you’d like to promote?
Of course my latest OST for the Movie “Hyde’s Secret Nightmare”
http://itunes.apple.com/us/album/revelation/id541356836?i=54135695
The film follows the tradition of Italian horror movies and directors like Dario Argento, Lucio Fulci,Mario Bava and also Federico Fellini.
The music inspiration comes from great composers such as Alex North, Ennio Morricone, Fabio Frizzi, The Goblin, Claudio Simonetti, Pino Donaggio, Bernard Herrmann. The soundtrack (more than an hour of music) explores lots of different genres, from classical Orchestra and Chamber Music, to Minimal and Progressive Rock Music from the seventies. I’ve tried to stay away from the clichès of modern horror music, looking for a sort of vintage sound.
I’ve also composed the trailer music for the movie. Last year, this trailer received a nomination in the “Music for Promotion” category at the International Film Music Awards “Jerry Goldsmith”.
An Interview with Kristian Sensini by John Mansell © 2012/2013
Kristian Sensini is a piano and flute player with a background in classical and jazz music. He has composed scores for numerous film and television productions and has been nominated in successive years at the Jerry Goldsmith International Film Music Awards. He studied for his Degree in Jazz at Pesaro Conservatory, Italy and follows Master classes and Workshop of Composition with: Ennio Morricone, Michael Giacchino, Nathan Barr, Dave Grusin and Christopher Lennertz. He has a natural ability to feel and interpret film, being able to enhance a project with his talent and creative ability. Kristian’s credits include: 7 GIORNI DELLA FINE DEL MONDO, HYDE’S SECRET NIGHTMARE, BRIGHTSIDE, WARSPEAR, P.O.E. POETRY OF EERIE.
John Mansell: Where and when were you born?
Kristian Sensini: I was born in Loreto, a city in the center of Italy, on November 18th, 1976.
John Mansell: What are you earliest memories of music of any kind?
Kristian Sensini: It’s hard to tell, my memories are mixed with the memory of the stories my parents told me. They say I was attracted to music since I was just some months old, and even if my parents weren’t musicians our house used to be full of music every day. I have some videos of myself pretending to play an old organ, and singing and dancing too. I had, and still have, a collection of vinyl records (mostly cartoon themes from the 70s and the 80s) and I remember I would use them to play music but also as Frisbees! I can remember my first, really boring, piano lessons when I was six or seven years old and the day my father bought me a grand piano, which is now in my studio.
John Mansell: Was writing music for film something that you always wanted to do?
Kristian Sensini: Writing music is something I’ve always done, and I’ve been a movie lover since I was kid, thanks to my father who showed me many great movies on vhs (well we had a Betamax…) and brought me to the cinema at least once a week. So, I think writing music for movies simply unites two of my passions: music and movies.
John Mansell: Are you from a family background that involves music at all?
Kristian Sensini: As I said, my parents never studied music and they can’t play any instrument, but they are very good in drawing, sculpting and painting, things I really can’t do. My grandfather was an amateur accordionist, or to be more precise, a fisarmonica player: I still have his fisarmonica, an amazing instrument dating back to the early 1900s. Unluckily, he died before I was born so I never met him: I hope some of his “music genes” have been passed down to me.
John Mansell: What musical education did you receive?
Kristian Sensini: I started studying piano at six, seven years old, but I got bored after a month or two. Then I continued as an autodidact, mostly, and I occasionally had some piano lessons but not for long periods of time. Growing up, I started studying the flute too and approaching the jazz language. I studied Musicology at the University of Bologna, Jazz at Berklee Summer Courses (on that occasion, I also won a scholarship) and I got my Jazz Degree at the Conservatory of Pesaro where I studied classical flute as well. Most recently, I’ve attended master-classes and workshops with great composers such as Morricone, Giacchino, Grusin, Bource and many others.
John Mansell: A number of your scores are for Horror films, is this a genre you are particularly attracted to or is this something that has just occurred because maybe producers associate you with horror pictures because your music has been successful within them?
Kristian Sensini: Well… both I think! I mean, I’ve been a huge horror fan since I was about 11 years old, I think I have seen nearly every horror movie released in the 80s and in the 90s. Even now I don’t miss a movie of that genre. I’m a fan of the Universal Monsters movies, I love the Nightmare series and the Friday the 13th saga, I’ve got a crush on Troma Flicks. Some of my favourite writers are Poe, Lovecaft and Stephen King. So I’m a kind of Horror Fan-boy, I’m really attracted to horror movies and I like to score them. It’s good to be associated with that genre and to receive such offers from producers and directors, because horror movies give you a lot of freedom when it comes to music: you can experiment strange harmonies, odd orchestrations and be really melodic at same time. Soundtracks for this kind of movies are not so popular among the critics; in fact the only horror score to win an Academy Award was the one for The Omen, by the amazing Jerry Goldsmith. People think that they don’t deserve much attention just because they are… commercial horror movies. To be honest, I think that writing a good score in that genre is really difficult; you play with people expectations, with their feelings and primordial fears. You often anticipate or show what can’t yet be seen on screen, it’s like being a magician who plays tricks to the audience to make them enjoy the show.
John Mansell: What composers either from the world of film or outside of it would you say have either influenced you or served as an inspiration to you and the way that you approach scoring a film ?
Kristian Sensini: I have a huge list but the following ones are particularly important to me: Hermann, Williams, Goldsmith, Shore, Morricone, Trovajoli, Rota and mo
st recently Giacchino, Marianelli and Greenwood. Outside the film field, the most influential composers are Mozart, Ravel, Dvorak, Debussy, Stravinskij and Bartòk. I’m also influenced by great jazz composers such as Mingus and Ellington and great rock bands such as Queen, Beatles and Pink Floyd.
John Mansell: HYDE’S SECRET NIGHTMARE has just been issued onto compact disc, this is on Kronos records, the score is certainly an atmospheric one and well suited to the films subject matter. Did you have any involvement in the production of the CD, by this I mean were you responsible for selecting what music would go onto the disc?
Kristian Sensini: I just did it all my self, say, composed, performed and recorded. I’m responsible of part of the graphics as well. I decided to include every single note I had played for this movie, so there isn’t a real selection. I like the idea that if someone buys a record, this record should be of the maximum length possible, so I’ve also inserted some bonus materials and previously unreleased tracks.
John Mansell: What size orchestra did you utilize on HYDE’S SECRET NIGHTMARE and where was the score recorded?
Kristian Sensini: The orchestra you listen to on the record is all digital samples, except for the flute, which is played by me. The budget didn’t allow the use of a real orchestra, so I used a variety of ensembles, big orchestras in some cues (overdubs and overdubs of orchestral sections that make a huge sound), prog-rock ensembles (in the style of horror soundtracks from the 70s), small chamber ensembles, jazz combos and so on. As I said, horror scores give a lot of freedom to a composer. Being all digital, I’ve recorded everything in my own home studio.
John Mansell: Do you orchestrate all of your own music and do you ever perform on any of your scores?
Kristian Sensini: I orchestrate every single cue and I perform, through a keyboard, or on my flute, every single note you hear in the soundtrack. This is a great thing, the good part of not working with a real orchestra. The bad part is that there are no real instruments… I’d like to work on movies where a real, even small, orchestra is hired. Unluckily, nowadays this happens very rarely, as directors and producers think that a good sample orchestra is good enough. And this happens not only with small/medium composers like me…
John Mansell: Do you conduct at all, if so do you conduct all of your film scores or are there times when you have a conductor so that you can monitor things from the control booth?
Kristian Sensini: I especially like to conduct choirs or jazz groups, but this isn’t usually the case in my soundtracks.
John Mansell: When writing a score how many times would you normally view the film or project before you began to get fixed ideas about what music you will compose or how much music etc. will be needed?
Kristian Sensini: I try to be… “Pure” and trust my first impressions: I usually watch the movie cue by cue and start writing some ideas or improvising something after the very first “view”. Having studied and practised improvisation, I’ve learnt to trust my instinct. Sometimes my first ideas are good enough, some other times they aren’t, so I go back on my steps and try something different.
John Mansell: Do you work out your musical ideas on the keyboard before you commit them to the score or do you utilize computer etc to do this?
Kristian Sensini: It depends on if I’m in a rush or not… sometimes directors ask you a full orchestrated digital mockup of a specific cue to be ready in a day or even in a few hours. In such cases composition, orchestration and recording are the same process. When I have time I prefer to sit on my grand piano and compose with paper, pencil… and eraser…
John Mansell: What do you feel is the purpose of music within film?
Kristian Sensini: To help the narration of the story, to unveil facts, places, feelings and characters that are not visible as far as “images” are concerned. It’s a great way to save time when you tell a story: with just a couple of notes or the use of a particular timbre you can put a scene in a specific time in the past or future, on in a specific land or country. It’s pure magic!
John Mansell: Do you buy Compact Discs at all, if so what music features prominently within your collection, is it a mixture of all types of music?
Kristian Sensini: I love to buy compact discs and vinyl; I get nostalgic with those… I have a bit of everything, lots of jazz recordings, soundtracks and classical music, early medieval music and rock.
John Mansell: What are you working on at the moment?
Kristian Sensini: I’ve just written some string quartets for a commercial and I’m recording an album of instrumental music, mostly for piano, with a cinematic taste. I’m dealing with a couple of projects that will start really soon, but I can’t talk about them until they’re confirmed… I’m a little bit superstitious on this!
Here’s a preview of the interview i did for a multimedia project by Reese Spykerman
1. Why did you choose to become a composer?
I didn’t choose it really. I mean from a philosophical point of view… I think it’s something you can’t choose, it is like breathing. A deep need to express yourself. Some people write poems or paint, so it’s just the choice of the medium… I remember that even when I was a child I enjoyed improvising short melodies more than playing other people’s music. Growing up I’ve played some rock and jazz and people have always told me that my music could have been good as a movie soundtrack. I’ve been a big movie fan since I was really young, that’s simply my favourite way to spend time. So I guess that becoming a professional film composer was in some way something I was destined to.
2. When you were learning about composition, what things that you learned
surprised you the most?
That creating music is often to assimilate really rigid rules, and then forget them and break every rule you learnt. Talking about Art, the best ideas and solutions come when you push the limit imposed by tradition.
3. In your education, was the focus mostly on technical? Or did issues such
as crafting a story through music, and principles like balance, contrast,
and audience energy play a role?
I have a strong jazz background, so I’ve got a really instinctive and quite improvisational approach when crafting soundtracks. I’ve also studied classical music and orchestration to “speed-up” my work and to understand
what could be good or wrong in a specific contest. Listening to the great masters of film music is still an amazing training for me, I tend to trust my ears when I have to choose a solution or another. If I feel that something doesn’t work, then technical studies help me find what it is. But the first thing is of course to tell a story with the music, or better, help the movie to tell the story. This is about feeling and no school can teach you how to do it.
4. How do you utilize contrast in your work, both macro and micro?
I use both of them, maybe more in a micro way. That’s because I usually keep some common elements in my projects, little clues which let listeners know that different tracks come from the same project. But, of course, when I
work on big projects like a feature movie I like to add variety to the tracklist. As a listener, I do love it when I can listen to a soundtrack and enjoy the album even if I didn’t see the movie. That’s the reason why I always try and add some contrast in the style of the various tracks: it is meant to work as a metalanguage in the context of each single cue/scene, when that helps the scene itself. Sometimes the use of contrast can be just useless or a way to impose a composer’s art over the movie.
5. Can you explain some techniques composers use to introduce contrast?
(e.g. change in tempo, layering, pauses, etc)
Being the jazz musician that I am, I like to use pauses, not regarded as absence of music, but as a way to enhance the dialogue of instruments. My focus is often on the harmonic contrast as well, or on the use and interaction of instruments.
6. Why is contrast in music important?
Because if we don’t use it, music could be really… boring. Think about a persons who always talks in the same “vocal-tone”, like a robot. That person could tell you the most amazing story you’ve ever heard, but after a minute or two you just stop listening… Using contrast helps tell the story and holds the listener’s attention!
7. Is contrast more difficult to accomplish in shorter pieces? Is it more
important in longer pieces?
It’s the same… in shorter pieces you may have less time to build up the athmosphere and to create different contrasts, it really depends which way you choose. Rhythmic contrasts work less in this case, it’s better to use harmonic contrast for shorter pieces.
8. What are some of your favorite modern pieces of music (aside from your
work) that have great contrast in them?
I really like the “mood incongruency” that is used for the iconic contrast in movies, expecially in comedies and animation: it happens when the emotive meaning of music conflicts with the one of the film. I think Danny Elfman is a master in this art.
Check this interview on http://trailermusicvibe.blogspot.it/2012/08/kristian-sensini-interview.html?spref=tw
The site itself is amazing so follow them!
Meet Kristian Sensini – another emerging composer from the cupboards of the production music industry. He was thrilled to interview with Trailer Music Vibe and I am happy present to you now the following interview. Be sure to follow Sensini on Facebook.
How did you become a composer?
Since I was really young, I have always enjoyed creating music instead of playing music of other people. I’ve grown up with the greatest movies of the eighties and, thanks to my father, I got to know the Italian Movies from the sixties and the seventies. This of course has represented a big influence on my music.
I’ve also played in several rock bands and jazz combos (I graduated in Jazz at Pesaro Conservatory in Italy) and people always told me that my instrumental music was really evocative, “like a soundtrack”. This drove me to try and work on my first project, and now to work as a professional composer for films, tv and videogames.
What inspires you?
Everything really; obviously I listen to a lot of music (not only soundtracks from the Golden Age of Hollywood, but Rock, Jazz and Classical Music). I usually get inspired by good stories, movies, books and even everyday life with its dark and light moments. I’m not one of those musicians that derives inspiration from just sitting in their studios: I think that the time I spend out of the studio (when I take a walk for example) is as important as the time I spend in it, playing piano and experimenting on melody and harmony.
What was your defining moment?
As a composer, I think I’m not a “defined artist”; I mean that I discover new things every day, develop new ideas, try new harmonic/melodic/timbric solutions. I can say that I have at least a defining moment… per week, when I discover something in my music that I particularly like and I’m usually a bit of a critic in my work. Talking about my composer career, I think there have been a couple of “defining” moments: the first full movie scored for an American director (Butterfly Rising by Tanya Wright) and the first nomination I’ve received in 2010 at the Jerry Goldsmith Film Music Awards, in Spain. I’m a composer who lives in a really small town in Italy and it’s sort of difficult to have international visibility, not working in a big city, or in the USA for example. So these international acknowledgments had truly defined my career (I currently have an agent in the USA who helps me find job opportunities outside Italy).
What can you tell TMV about upcoming projects?
I’ve just released on Itunes my latest soundtrack, “Hyde’s Secret Nightmare”, from the movie directed by Domiziano Cristopharo.
The soundtrack will be available on CD in September for Kronos Records. They have released soundtracks composed by some of the best Italian Film Composers, such as Piero Piccioni, Piero Umiliani & Francesco de Masi .
In this period I’m reading a couple of scripts (for a horror movie and a documentary), but I can’t tell you anything more about these projects…
In addition, I have just started a group of composers to realize compositions for music libraries and trailer houses http://www.soundalike.net/ (we had some placements for Discovery Channel , History Channel and Mediaset – the biggest tv network in Italy). It’s a lot of fun, because you have more freedom and I may have the chance to make an action cue one day and a cool comedy music cue the next one. I’m lucky enough to work with amazing professionals here in Italy that are helping me create a fantastic catalogue (which you can listen to online on the website).
For all the news about my works I’d like to invite you to visit me on my official website , my Twitter & IMDB pages.
Comments?
Thank you so much for the interview. I’m a fan of your website and I always discover amazing new music there!
Another article from Spain! This time from www.asturscore.com
http://www.asturscore.com/kristian-sensini-nuevo-proyecto-de-mecenazgo/
Escrito por Rubén Franco, el 3 mayo 2012 | Publicado en Noticias
En un projecto parecido el de Carles Cases (aunque con muchas diferencias), el compositor italiano Kristian Sensini ha decidio poner en marcha un experimento donde tu puedes donar una determinada cantidad para conseguir la edición en CD o MP3 de su último score, la película de terror Hyde’s Secret Nightmare (2011).
En función de las aportaciones que se efectuen, tendrías derecho desde la descarga completa de MP3 del score (8$) o la edición en CD del score (12$) hasta la edición en CD y la licencia para usar uno de los cortes en tu propia película (70$) o la edición en CD más una composición original hecha por el compositor a petición tuya (250$).
El objetivo; conseguir 2.000$ para poder editar el CD (el compositor nos explica el desglose de gastos necesarios, que suman la cifra de 2.000 dólares).
A día de hoy, restan 118 días para poder alcanzar el objetivo, con una recaudación actual de 12$. En este enlace tienes más información sobre este interesante proyecto de mecenazgo que esperamos y deseamos le lleve a buen puerto.
Kristian Sensini fue uno de los compositores nominados a los Premios Jerry Goldsmith durante la V Edición del Festival Internacional de Música de Cine – Ciudad de Úbeda.
Un abrazo muy fuerte y mucha suerte.
