Scenes - this Saturday on BBC1

Scenes of a Sexual nature (which was my first big screen credit!) will air this Saturday, 17th November on BBC1 at 10:50pm.

It's a comedy set on Hampstead Heath one sunny afternoon, featuring various couples and their various issues with love and sex. Stars a whole bunch of British stars, including Ewan McGregor, Catherine Tate, Sophie Okonedo, Eileen Atkins and Andrew Lincoln.

I worked as orchestrator and trumpet player on this (plus I did a little conducting and music editing) with composer Dominik Scherrer.

how do you like them apples?

I took this picture at the Brent Respect Festival, where I was playing with the Spanner Jazz Punks. I believe this piece was called 'Before Newton'. The festival also featured the world's largest finger painting, and a bunch of people dancing round a maypole.

Also been busy participating in no less than four events at the Leytonstone Festival: playing with the London Swingfonia, Aneesa Chaudhry, the John Ongom Big Band, and at the Loaded Dog jam, which featured the marvellous Dick Pearce on trumpet as special guest.

The gig with Aneesa was with her new group: a kind of mini-big band with rhythm section and four horns. As well as playing trumpet I did the arranging - mostly downsized versions of existing big band arrangements. We also recently played at Pizza on the Park (which was sold out!)

Also been busy writing and producing music for the trailer for Lady Godiva - Back in the Saddle, a forthcoming British comedy. Not sure where or when the trailer will be in the cinemas..

DVDs on amazon

Gosh! How terrible, I haven't blogged for a whole month! I've been really busy working on a couple of TV things, doing the music copying, audio editing and a bit of orchestration and playing.

Anyhoo, thought I'd mention that a couple of things I worked on previously have recently become available on DVD.

First there's Scenes of a Sexual Nature, starring Ewan McGregor, Sophie Okonedo, Catherine Tate et al. It's a romantic comedy set on Hampstead Heath. I had to sign a release because apparently there might be a picture of me in the recording studio somewhere in the DVD extras - so if anybody buys this I'd be interested to know if they can see me!

Also there's Primeval Series 1, starring Douglas Henshall. Gotta say I'm a bit fan of this series, so perhaps I'll add it to my amazon wishlist!

Cinema trip

Last night, I went to see Scenes of a Sexual Nature (my first big screen credit) with my family and some friends.

I knew that my father wasn't exactly an ardent movie-goer - in fact, he reckoned that this was the first time he'd been to the cinema since about 1941 (when he saw Dumbo). I was sitting next to my sister, and gave her a prod every time I heard a bit where I was playing, and she in turn prodded my father who prodded mum, and so on along the line. Of course we stayed through the credits so that we could see my name, at which point a small ripple of applause came from our row (which was the only row still occupied by then).

Many thanks to everyone for coming along! Hope they enjoyed it (they said they did, but not sure they'd say if they didn't!)

SoaSN on Film 2006 and on the tube

Just seen Jonathan Ross reviewing Scenes of a Sexual Nature on his Film 2006 show on BBC1 - a very positive review, I'm happy to say. Also seeing posters for it around town and on the tube - all very exciting!

The film will be out on Friday at these cinemas, so please go along and see it!! (Btw I'm plugging this cos I orchestrated and played trumpet on it.)

Manual

A little while ago I wrote some music for Garth Donovan's forthcoming feature film, Manual. The blah on IMDB says:

Manual follows a brother and sister who come from a family of gifted hockey players. Once they began playing for serious high school programs they grew tired and quit. They feel like failures, thinking they disappointed their parents, and both wind up spinning out of control in vicious cycles of rebellion and self-destruction.

Btw this is an American film so when they say 'hockey', they mean 'ice-hockey'.. And they say 'vicious cycles', we say 'vicious circles'. Tomayto-tomahto etc etc. Anyway, I think it's a really nice film.

Here's one of my cues which accompanies a scene where the main character is lost in thought.. kind of day-dreaming, reflecting... in a brown study (what a great expression that is!) It's kind of ambient I suppose.



(Or if you can't see a player just above this, try clicking here.)

SoaSN trailer released

The trailer for Scenes of a Sexual Nature has now been released, and features my music, which I'm quite excited about! Haven't seen it at the cinema yet - I think it might be playing at the Vue in Leicester Square amongst other places. (Mind you, I wouldn't expect anyone - apart from me - to go to the cinema just to see a trailer). Looking forward to the UK-wide release of the film (it's my first big screen credit!) which will happen on November 3rd.

You can see the trailer here or here.

Lots of News about SoaSN!

Scenes of a Sexual Nature (which will be my first feature film credit!) will be released nationwide in the UK from Friday 3rd November 2006, playing in about 40 cinemas across the country. It has also been nominated for Best UK Feature Film at the Raindance Film Festival!

I wrote the music for the trailer, which should be appearing soon, so look out for it!

They've set it up on MySpace, so you can be the film's friend, if you are so inclined.

Phew! Too many exclamation marks in this post!!!! I'm off for a lie down in a darkened room!!!!!!

Two Families

I've recently finished orchestrating another film project for composer Dominik Scherrer. This one was a mafia film entitled Two Families, and was directed by Romano Scavolini. This was the first feature film project where I was the sole orchestrator, so it was all quite exciting (and a little bit nerve-wracking at times!) (Oh - and hard work too!!)

The score features the wonderful cellist Philip Sheppard. As well as playing 'straight' beautifully, he also gets some incredible sounds and special effects from his cello. It's really exciting to be working with great musicians like Philip.

Not sure when or where this film will come out - watch this space..

SoaSN in today's Evening Standard

Just seen that today's Evening Standard contains quite a large article about Scenes of a Sexual Nature, which I orchestrated for and played trumpet on. The article mainly focuses on Ewan McGregor's appearance in the film, and has a few nice pictures from it. According to the Standard, it'll be released in late October or early November.

Only Child

I recently finished doing the music for another short animated film by Jason Ruddy. Only Child is a poem about a lonely little girl, Petunia, who longs for a little brother, and Jason has animated the story. Jason has Paul Kaye reading the poem. (Mr Kaye also appeared in the Miss Marple episode I worked on recently - small world and all that.)

As this was a poetry reading, I decided to use solo piano. The story is set in a family home, so again I thought piano was appropriate. I used a great piano patch from Post Musical Instruments which they call 'The Old Lady' - it's a 1923 Steinway, and has a great deal of character. Using Kontakt 2's scripting facilities, it implements sympathetic resonance, so that non-struck keys sound if their string is currently undamped and they are harmonically related to a struck key. Or something.. anyhoo, it sounds good.

I understand that Jason is still polishing the film - watch this space for further developments..

Scenes of a Sexual Nature in Cannes

This film, which I orchestrated for and played trumpet on, was shown in Cannes the other day. I don't know at present when it will be on general release - watch this space! (Or better yet, watch this space!)

It Fell from the Sky wins!

I'm pleased to report that one of the films I wrote the music for, It Fell from the Sky, has won the Best Animation Award at the Screentest Festival. So congratulations to the animator, Jason Ruddy. I understand that as a result, the film will now be shown at the Raindance Film Festival later this year.

Here's the film if you'd like to see it:

Phew! Exciting Film Project Completed

The score for the Exciting Film Project was delivered on Friday, so finally I have a little time to blog more about it.

It's really been a crazy couple of weeks. First of all working on the orchestrations for Dominik's music (along with the other orchestrator, Richard Hammarton). Then we had to record everything. I already blogged a little bit about recording the strings, and on the same day we recorded woodwinds (all played by Andy Findon), and the trumpet (me), all at Dominik's Crimson Noise studio. To get a nice big trumpet section sound, we often layered three or even six of me on top of each other. Further recordings of vocals and rhythm section took place over the next two or three days.

I've been working nights for the final week, editing the recordings and generally preparing the cues for Dominik to mix the next day. I would get to the studio at 9pm, and work through till around 7am the next morning. Then I was off to Ponti's in Liverpool Street station for a big fry-up (which was very good, apart from that the restaurant was freezing). Incidentally, I found working nights to be a pretty unusual experience: usually, life seems to be clearly divided into days, but while I was on this schedule, this delineation disappeared; I appreciated how time was just a constant flow. Hmmmmm.. Sad to say, I was so busy contemplating this coming home one morning, that I managed to leave my glasses on the train. (So if you happen to find a pair of black-rimmed Specsavers' glasses between Liverpool Street and Chingford, please let me know.)

A final flurry of activity on the last night/day: Dominik asked me to write and play one or two final trumpet bits for the credits music - and then I was done.

So it's been pretty hard work, and I had to put my regular life on hold for a while, but of course I am very happy to have been involved in such a project (sorry - I'm still not supposed to go into details about it - as soon as I can, I will!)

Latest on the Exciting Film Project

I've been really busy over the past couple of weeks working on the exciting film project.

A few days ago we recorded the violins at Angel Studios. Dominik, the composer, asked me to conduct one of the cues - it was a really big thrill for me to conduct such wonderful players, and in such a posh studio! To be honest, I was a little nervous, but the players were so professional, it went quite smoothly I think.

I have to rush off again now, so I'll catch up with other stuff soon!

Exciting-yet-mysterious film project

I'm currently working with composer Dominik Scherrer, who is writing the score for a forth-coming feature film. It's very exciting to be involved with this project, as there are some very well known actors appearing in it - but I'm afraid I can't say too much more about it at the moment..

Officially, I am supposed to be the orchestrator, but so far I've been helping out in any way I can: e.g. being an extra pair of ears at recording sessions, carrying heavy stuff, keeping track of takes, making tea, editing takes, and generally shoving my oar in. I've also been playing trumpet on a couple of cues.

I'll have more to post about this project as it progresses (and hopefully it won't all be about who I made cups of tea for).

Desire

Here's another animated film which I recently did the music for. It's called Desire, and is by Sanghee Park.



(This movie is 11MB and is in Quicktime format.)

It Fell from the Sky

Been pretty busy over the past month working on the music for a couple of animated films. Here is one of them: It Fell from the Sky by Jason Ruddy.



(This movie is around 13MB. You will need Quicktime - which is a free download - to view it. Hope this thing works - I don't think I used <embed> before..)