After the first uneasy steps of composed film music, the answer to the question of how film music sounds has been unambiguous for many years. But that has changed. The issue of available resources plays a major role in this.

It must have been around 1986 when the question "Are we going to record with real instruments, or with an electronic orchestra?" was seriously considered. For the first time, it had become possible to record a sample that lasted more than 8 seconds. And suddenly we could "fake" the instruments of an entire orchestra with a computer.

 The computer was not the first electronic extension of resources. Electro-instrumental music had been introduced into pop music as early as the 1950s, and synthesizers were widely available through the 1970s and early 80’s. I myself used synthesizers in music compositions for dance and theater at that time. I eagerly made use of existing studios; operating the devices myself seemed daunting. I went to the studio with sketches on music paper and a description of the sounds I wanted to hear, and the studio boss would create the sounds. As a trained pianist the keyboard itself held few secrets for me. The millions of possibilities to extract multicolored sounds from the synthesizers gave intense satisfaction.

It is not unlikely that this early experience with synthesizers contributed to my first big success as a film composer, with De Vierde Man by Paul Verhoeven. Critics noted that the special use of the strings in particular made the sound of the orchestral music new, hitting exactly the right spot for this particular film.

And this did not go unnoticed.

A few years later, my telephone rang in the middle of the night. It was Hollywood director Joel Schumacher: There was a movie starring the young Johnny Depp in need of music and there was a budget, and before I knew it, I found myself at LAX. I was picked up by a producer who was familiar with The Fourth Man: As it turned out, the movie had gained cult film status in Hollywood.

Even though the filmmusic was written for a symphony orchestra, he inquired if I had used a synthesizer. The process of composing a bulky orchestral score is grueling and lengthy, so it was quite shocking to be asked if my sound had been the result of “pushing a couple of buttons”.

I later listened back to the score and tried to hear what he had heard. I found that indeed, it sounded as if the composer had written synthesizer-esque sounds for the orchestra.

I realized something: If you can copy an orchestra with electronics, you can also copy electronics with an orchestra.

 In the 70's and 80's, music and sound design were still kept strictly separate. The term design was rarely used: it was atmo, film sound, sound effects.

As a composer, I don't remember ever consulting with the sound guys. Not even on the famous Warner Brothers Sound stage. It always fit together somehow, or it was made to fit.

 Nowadays this practice is different. Since the 90’s, film music and film sound have rapidly merged into a coherent blend of sound, working together to support the purpose of the film. Sometimes the composer even does the entire sound post-processing.

It is quite common to use orchestral music in films or series with a historical touch. In The Queen’s Gambit we find a striking example of a series in which the music, by Carlos Rafael Rivera, is brilliantly composed, not relying only on the usual emotional value of orchestral colours, but also using true musical building blocks -as if someone like Beethoven has been transpiring from the temp music.

Now that’s cooking; to everyone’s delight, a real chef is speaking here!

 Come and see! Come and listen!

 Loek Dikker

Jazz pianist
Film composer
Chairman of Music Institute MultiMedia