If you write music with the intention of getting it used in film and television, the rules of engagement are substantially different than writing songs for artists (including yourself or your band) to record. Of course, working for a film and television projects are not identical either, due to the way those industries operate, but much of that is irrelevant, and we will look at the things they have in common.
While you don’t need to worry about arranging in a style that suits a specific artist, as you would to pitch a song, you do need to produce a product that fits into a specific niche, and the arranging and production tasks might be even more difficult. Music for video is, for the most part, all about niches. When you write music to pitch for use in video formats (as opposed to writing to a specific video), instrumentals, novelty songs, ballads, theme songs, and cues are all part of the mix. You don’t have to do all of them—you can specialize. But you don’t have to, either.
What you will need to do, if you write songs, is prepare multiple versions of your productions—with and without vocals, and for both instrumentals and songs you will be asked for versions that are one minute, thirty seconds and even 10 seconds long. Learning to create these versions is a great thing. First it will make you aware of the need for a hook in your piece and how hooks work. This will make your music stand out and be remembered. Next, automatically doing them makes you more competitive, because a music super might want to uses these snips of your piece throughout the program. A title song might have the hook reprised. And that means bigger checks from your performance rights organization (PRO) when the project is shown.
Many times the demand is for replacement tracks. The music supervisor has used some well known recording in a scene during editing, but now needs a song to replace it. Often the temporary track was picked because it had the right vibe—the tempo, feel, some lyrics. Now you are asked to write and produce a replacement track. And usually very quickly. The challenge is to capture the feel of the track without copying it. Typically, a cover version won’t work—it would be too expensive, or the rights to the song are not available. This has to be original work that is very close to that song.
To develop the skills needed for doing this (which will make you very popular with music supervisors) you can start doing it on your own. Find classic songs by the Rolling Stones, or The Beatles, or contemporary songs by your favorite artists, or period songs, and create tunes that sound like they could be played on the same radio station. Use your favorite music, the stuff you are inclines to listen to, at least to start, because you need to develop a sense of when your songs sound like they fit in perfectly. Later you can branch into other styles, especially if you see a trend in the kinds of music being used. But at first, just go with what you already know.
This effort accomplishes two things: it teaches you to find the essence of these songs (in the writing, the arrangement, and the performance) so that you can do it when an opportunity comes up; it gives you a bunch of songs to put into music libraries that will attractive to music supervisors.
You can do the same with a variety of niche music, whether it is klezmer tunes, old blues, or big band. The advantage of smaller niches is that there is less competition. Not long ago I saw a call for Russian button accordion music. I doubt there were many submissions. There are often calls for specific types of world music, such as Middle Eastern, or Chinese.
As you work, keep in mind all the influences that you study, so that when you put them in libraries you can list them all in the “sounds like” box that feeds the search engines. Make it obvious and easy for music supervisors to find them.
The originality in these tunes and productions lies in how much they capture the feel and spirit of some of the best known and loved examples in that genre. You should be adding to the genre. And the more you do it, the better you will be able to do it. No one said this would be easy—just exciting.
So this is how you start. Later we will discuss getting your music to the right people and writing music for a specific video.
Tags: film and tv, Songwriting
About the Author
Ed Teja
Ed Teja is a musician, composer, and book author who writes, arranges, and performs a variety of music.
Last 5 posts by Ed Teja
- Avoiding the long, sharp teeth of song vampires - February 9th, 2010
- Modeling a nonexistent industry? - February 2nd, 2010
- Adapting to changes - January 25th, 2010
- Narrow your focus - January 2nd, 2010
- The year end refocus - December 30th, 2009
