Billboard and the Hollywood Reporter got together last week to throw an entire conference about Film & TV Music at the Beverly Hilton. We’re certain our invitation was lost in the mail.
Even if it wasn’t, we were especially intrigued by both mags’ coverage of the songwriter’s session panel which featured Sondre Lerche, Jesse Harris and (Alanis Morissette collaborator) Glen Ballard. As we’re certain you remember from The Playlist’s extensive and on-going coverage of “Dan In Real Life“ and ” The Hottest State“, these gentlemen songwriters have had quite a year of exposure via their respective film vehicles.
We were especially charmed by their quote from Sondre Lerche regarding his intensive work and backwards writing style for “Dan in Real Life”. Apparently Mr. Lerche found his inspiration writing songs for the film during his multiple visits to the set as it was shot. This was Lerche’s first time creating an original score for a film and, as he relayed to the panel, “I found out only later that this is not how soundtracks are usually made.”
This thought, plus recent repeated viewings of “Pump Up the Volume”, prompt the question: is it time to throw away the old model of sticking songs into a movie wherever and licensing from indie artists only because they’re not clever enough to have publishing deals and therefore cheaper? Would movie and TV soundtracks actually make money if they were more intimately tied into the vehicle they represent? A look at the SoundScan figures for the movie/soundtrack model that best exemplifies this idea, “Once”, suggest the answer is yes: it has quietly sold 172K albums to date and is, so far, the #14 selling “independent” album for 2007.
The songwriter panelists also reportedly agreed that the best work is not recycled crap they have sitting around but original material created specifically for the film. This makes us want to have a sit down with Ballard, who penned some original music for that studio beast “Beowulf” to ask him exactly what he found inspiring there. Really, we’re just curious.
“Beowulf” Trailer – for inspirational purposes:
