Film guy at SXSW: film music, the bastard stepchild of post production (a panel discussion)

by John P. Meyer

BMI's Doreen Ringer-Ross moderated a group of industry musicologists on a stage at the Austin Convention Center on Sunday (March 15). Since it was "bright and early" (i.e., 11 a.m.) after a potentially long night of film fest partying, the crowd was both sparse and subdued - but this seemed to have resulted in a "wheat from chaff" effect, given that all the attendees seemed vitally interested in the subject matter and ended up dominating the last 20 minutes of the discussion with their questions.

At the table with Ms. Ringer-Ross were:

* John Anderson, head of Hunnypot Unlimited, a publishing and advertising placement company.

* Linda Kordek of The Agency Group, who reps for film and television composers.

* Michelle Belcher of Primary Wave Music, a west coast music supervisor and publisher. Michelle specializes in film and television music placement.

* Paul Haslinger, ex Tangerine Dream guy and currently a composer and producer of music for the movies (Minority Report, Death Race, Garden of Eden).

* Ron Mann, Canadian documentarist, perhaps best known for his films Comic Book Confidential, Grass and Know Your Mushrooms.

* Grant Lee Phillips, songwriter, artist and multi-instrumentalist, who has composed music for both TV and film (House, Grey's Anatomy, Gilmore Girls)

Ron Mann offered insight on how a filmmaker coordinates with a composer to get the music he wants for his film using a recent example: Grant Lee Phillips had been recommended to him and he approached him with a film idea. Grant said, "give me three months and I'll have something for you." Mann, figuring "yeah, right," was pleasantly surprised with - three months later - Phillips sent him a seven minute song that fit the concept so well that he rearranged the film to better feature it.

There was a lot of talk about the way technology (in terms of internet access) is changing the way music is distributed and paid for - with the bottom line being that, sometimes, it's not (being paid for). And some of the biggest names in music are pricing themselves out of the film market by demanding exorbitant fees for licensing rights.

In terms of the way filmmakers can sometimes put composers in harm's way, Haslinger cited the example of Tyler Bates' music for 300, which he (Haslinger) said marked the first time one film composer had been sued for "borrowing" themes created by another (in this case, Elliot Goldenthal's score for Titus). As the story goes, the production crew started with the Goldenthal score as a temp track, and every time Tyler tried to alter it they steered him back in the original direction. Haslinger pointed out that the practice of "borrowing" music themes is endemic and can be traced back at least as far as Bach's appropriation of folk themes for his symphonic compositions.

Mann delivered the best anecdote of the discussion when he explained how he'd approached Steve Miller's people to license "The Joker" for his film Grass. Seems Miller was touring at the time under the Budweiser banner, and they were afraid that the marijuana association might be seen as promoting a competing intoxicant. And then he approached Paul McCartney's crew for use of "Hi, Hi, Hi," but the representative sternly informed him that "the song is NOT about drugs."

According to the publishing and licensing folks (Anderson, Kordek and Belcher), an indie filmmaker should expect to allocate 3% - 7% of their budget for music rights - and that jumps to 10% or more if the film is to be heavily populated with songs. Kordek noted that one might expect to spend $10,000 to $25,000 when contracting a composer to score a film.

Several of the questions from the audience came from aspiring filmmakers who wanted to know a) what they could get away with if they - um - "used" copyrighted music in their films, and b) how they could find composers to work "on the cheap" for their film projects.

Answers:

a) you'll probably be fine, as long as your film never makes it to the festival circuit or achieves any other sort of general distribution - in which case, you're screwed for not obtaining the rights to begin with.

b) several musicians in the audience said: "give me a call."

... which brought up the subject of MySpace as a networking and marketing tool. Mann and Phillips find it an excellent means of sampling music from bands and composers who are not yet at the Aerosmith level of recognition. Mann stated that he'd actually found and licensed music for use in his films that he'd discovered on a band's MySpace page. (For a lot less than Aerosmith songs would have cost.)

Anderson, Kordek and Belcher faced a tough question which characterized them and their industry as impediments to independent filmmakers and those creating content for the web. Belcher stated that certain rights (web use, for instance) could be obtained for next to nothing - if the prospective user would simply go to the effort of contacting the rights owners.

We'll close with another Mann story: there was a specific piece of music he just HAD to have in order to proceed with the film he was eager to make. On first approach, the songwriter was reluctant - so he started sending her a dozen roses, and continued doing so, week after week, until she finally broke down and told him he could use the song if he'd just stop with the flowers already.

Moral of the story: if you want something badly enough, just keep plugging away.

BONUS PIC: as I was walking from the parking garage to the convention center, I had these two guys offer me a burrito. I turned them down, but decided they were photogenic and so snapped their photo. They're promoting a site called Reframe It.