# How did you land your first gig(s)?



## RyBen (Aug 12, 2011)

... and what preparations did you take beforehand in terms of craft?


-Ryan


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## EastWest Lurker (Aug 12, 2011)

I was working as Roslyn Kind's musical director. (She is Barbra Streisand's half-sister.) She was signed to act in a movie playing a singer and they wanted a few original songs, so I wrote them and they really iked them. I said to the director, "Why not let me do the score as well?" and he said fine.

I had been in LA a few years at that point having gotten my degree in composition from the Boston Conservatory and I was studying orchestration with Albert Harris. I had become friendly with David Michael Frank, who was scoring a bunch of TV movies at that time and he provided me with a lot of invaluable tips and advice. Nonetheless, I did a dreadful job. Some things you can only learn by making mistakes.


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## José Herring (Aug 12, 2011)

RyBen @ Fri Aug 12 said:


> ... and what preparations did you take beforehand in terms of craft?
> 
> 
> -Ryan



There's no preparation for learning how to score a film. You really have to dive right in.

I got my first "professional' gig by calling the director. They couldn't have been meaner. They kept on saying that they were not going to hire me because they were trying to get Bon Jovi. Suggesting over and over again that I was nobody. This was insulting because I had just graduated from Juilliard and had a big ego. 

Once they figured out that Bon Jovi wasn't at all interested in scoring their film I got the job. In retrospect it wouldn't have mattered if I did the job or not. But, it did teach me to be persistent no matter what the odds because I found out that the one who gets the job is usually the last man standing. Once they've gone through all the "names" then they pick whoever is in their face. 

I got my next gig by walking into the editing studio and asking if they needed a composer. It was at this place that rented editing studios by the hour. I was there trying to make a video reel of my stuff. It was going horribly as I didn't know anything about editing. After about two hours I gave up and started looking around the place. There were these people there that looked like they knew what they were doing and had a long term editing arrangement. Being young and full or courage I poked my head in and asked if they needed somebody to do the music. To my surprise they said yes. So I got their number and called them back asked what they wanted and gave them a reel of my music. They liked it well enough and they hired me. It turned out to be a pretty successful documentary that still pays a little even today. Ended up winning a couple of festivals too. The film maker was this woman who was kind of on the streets a bit and had a lot of respect for people that had guts and she figured I had guts by walking in on them.

These films were in NY. My first LA film I got just by calling. I had an agent and they weren't doing dick for me. I mean they were trying. So, I decided after a few months of that crap, I would just be my own agent. So I got a magazine and found a company that was doing like 30 "B" films a year. I figured surely they must need a composer for at least one of them. So I called the company and spoke to the music supervisor. She told me they were looking for some "Basic Instinct" type stuff for a film. I said I was up for it, but I wasn't interested in anything that was soft porn. :lol: She said not to worry. Well it turned out the film was staring Traci Lords. I said, damn. wtf, but Traci was trying to be a legit actress so I agreed(begged) to do it. The next thing I know the film was headed for HBO primetime and I ended up getting a ton of money for it. Though it's died off a lot I still get a big check now and again for it. Not house buying type money but more than I thought possible at the time.

Trick is not to listen to anybody. They'll all tell you how hard it is. It's not hard. It just takes guts. I noticed that the only times I don't work is when I've lost confidence. There's so much music out there. Most of it not good. And, even the good stuff gets heavily panned by people. So, the only advice I ever like to give is to not worry about whether you're good enough or prepared enough. Know that you're not good enough and you could never be prepared enough. :lol: Even the top film composers produce a lot of crap imo. Scoring films is hard and it doesn't always lead to the best music. You just have to have it in your gut that no matter what you'll hang in there and you'll work your ass off. In my experience people respond more to that than to the magnificent composer. Because as one of the top guys told me, sometimes they want bad music and you have to do the best you can. You just have to be willing to work hard. If you can do that you'll beat out anybody who's just being a composer. You have to do so much more than compose music and the only time I ever failed at a professional gig was due to technical limitations not musically.

Also, they hear things differently than composers do. They could care or less if your samples have legato and usually can't tell real from fake stuff anyway. So you have to learn to hear music as they do. They hear emotional impact and musicality. If they say it sounds "synthy" they mean it is not musical or stiff sounding. As by experience I've replaced good samples with synth strings that really did sound synthy but synth strings stuff passed because it sounded more natural musically. I only say this because I run across a lot of composers who are waiting to get that "perfect" reel ya know one that sounds like TJ's stuff or something. That would be admirable and I hope my sample stuff sounds that good someday, but in reality I've never run across any film maker or music supervisor that knew enough about what we do to even know the difference between Vienna, EW or Sonic Implants. They just want to know if it works in their film or TV show. That's why top names in TV sometimes use what I consider the most horrible samples but they work for them and these composers are working nonstop. I only mention this because sometimes a community of a bunch of composers like VI can be so concerned about what samples somebody is using that it can sort of skew an aspiring composers viewpoint. And often I hear music that is technically perfect but lacks the kinds of things that people would look for in film or tv music. 

best,


Jose


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## synthetic (Aug 12, 2011)

Jose, awesome post. Occasionally I find something on this board that's so good I save it to a file, this was definitely one of the few that are worth saving. Thanks for sharing that. 



> I noticed that the only times I don't work is when I've lost confidence. There's so much music out there. Most of it not good. And, even the good stuff gets heavily panned by people. So, the only advice I ever like to give is to not worry about whether you're good enough or prepared enough. Know that you're not good enough and you could never be prepared enough.



I read something similar recently about working for yourself. They said that you should forget about waiting for the million dollar idea that no one has ever thought of. Fifty people have thought of whatever you come up with. The question is how many stick with the idea long enough to make it happen.


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## stonzthro (Aug 12, 2011)

Excellent post Jose!


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## José Herring (Aug 12, 2011)

synthetic @ Fri Aug 12 said:


> Jose, awesome post. Occasionally I find something on this board that's so good I save it to a file, this was definitely one of the few that are worth saving. Thanks for sharing that.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Ha! funny that you singled that out. 

I can only speak from my experience and I know there a lot of people even very successful people that have had a completely different experience. But, for me at least 1/2 of the stuff I did when I was just "starting out" I only got to do because I was the only person that couldn't be scared away. Sometimes the abuse can be epic in this business. There was a period in the late '90ies there where I was afraid to pick up the phone because I feared that some big wig was going to be yelling at me for daring to call him or submit a CD. Agents are notorious for this and throughout the years I've become the biggest agent hater in town. Though Charlie Clouser experience with agents has made me reconsider going back down that route again.


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## RyBen (Aug 12, 2011)

> There's no preparation for learning how to score a film. You really have to dive right in.



Hah, wow. Thanks for taking the time to tell me your story Jose. It's pretty encouraging compared to all those who say how hard it is. I think you're really right about the courage part.

Thanks Lurker as well.

-Ryan


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## gsilbers (Aug 12, 2011)

i had a song placed by some music library. dont even remember which one but i got a called from an video editor which he liked my song and wanted to use it as a main theme in a low budget car racing movie and also ask me to score the end scene and the catch was not to use any orchestral music, just electronic and rock hybrid. 
so happy to do. 

then got a called again from the editor again to see if i wanted to compose a whole feature. we developed a friendship and he was cool. 
and then dealt with the director. 

it was a hard learning experience mostly with sync and logic. i was very used to pro tools easy approach and logic's sync features are a bit of an odd ball if u dont know them at 1st. 

as for music prep, i had a minor in trad music then went to berklee and ive been composing electronic music for a long time. and my main instrument is classical guitar. >8o talk about odd ball  
so my next big purchase of course is a ztar _-)


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## Mike Greene (Aug 12, 2011)

A friend of mine hosted a weekly poker game. Some of the guys were new to me, but we all became friends. It was a low stakes game and basically just an excuse to drink beer and get away from our girlfriends (none of us were married at the time.)

One night, one of the guys mentioned that he was directing a Hot Wheels commercial, but he was really unhappy with the music he was getting from the usual Mattel composers. It sounded like "TV guys trying to do rock," as he put it. He knew I played in a rock band, so he asked me if I'd take a shot at it. I jumped at the chance. I think I got paid $1,500, which at the time I thought was a ton of money.

The track came out pretty good, if I do say so myself. Better yet, the spot wound up being a huge hit with Mattel, so my friend became their darling director and was working non-stop for them. I was always hired for all his gigs, and as editors or producers or whoever involved would meet me, they'd bring me along on _their_ next gig. And on those other people's gigs, I'd meet even _more_ new people, and like a venereal disease, I was spreading all over the place.

70% of all my TV/Film work can be traced back to that Hot Wheels spot. (From the Hot Wheels spot, I met person A, who then did commercial B, where I met person C, who hired me to do TV Show D, where I met . . . and so on. They almost all can be traced back to that one original spot.)

Interestingly, almost all of the remaining 30% of my gigs which aren't rooted in the Hot Wheels spot can be traced back to the Bill Nye show . . . which believe it or not, this same director had a hand in getting me hired. Total coincidence. He wasn't associated at all with the show, but by sheer coincidence, it so happens that one of the show's creators is my friend's ex brother in law. They didn't know any composers, so they asked him if he knew anyone. He recommended me and I wound up getting the gig, which has been the other fruit-bearing tree for me, in terms of leading to other gigs. So almost all my TV/Film work is owed to this guy.

So yes, when he made a self financed film, I scored it for free. :mrgreen:

As far as preparation goes, I did none. I wanted to be a rock star. I never had any intentions of being a film/TV composer. It just fell in my lap, which is lucky, because the whole rock star thing didn't quite work out.

For commercials, of course, there's not a lot of schooling necessary, since jingles are a different racket than real scoring. It's basically just songwriting, which I've always been comfortable with. But I did have to do a few "score" gigs way before I was really ready, and I cringe when I think back at my first attempts to truly score to picture.


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## bdr (Aug 12, 2011)

In the time honoured Hollywood tradition-nepotism.


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## Guy Bacos (Aug 12, 2011)

I had professional gigs way back, but as far as scoring films I can say this:

I had sent a demo reel, a long time ago, to a bunch of people, this guy had took note of it, and was looking for an additional composer for a big budget canadian movie "Eternal" (2004), unfortunately by the time he tried to get in touch with me, they had changed the regional code of my area, so the phone number on the CD was useless, however, he persisted in trying to reach me and managed to reach my sister, she then gave him my phone number. This demo reel was at least 5 years old, so when he called me, I was very surprised since I had given up on that demo reel. I did another demo for him closer to the style of movie this was about, horror/suspense, and that impressed him a lot, and the directors also liked it. So I officially got on board adding to the 2 other composers, but was only suppose to fill in here and there, but I was quite sneaky, I managed to constantly take initiative even for scenes I wasn't suppose to, for example, there was one scene the directors had a specific piece they wanted and this was the kind of scene where the music could shine in a melodic way, so I took the risque of scoring that scene with my own composition, I was quite convinced it was just as good if not better than what they wanted, well, it became one of the favorite musical moments of the movie, the directors loved it. When the director was not happy about a scene another guy did and started getting impatient, I would often take the challenge of scoring my own version of that scene, I ket taking more initiative and at the end had scored at least 50% of the movie, and originally I was only suppose to do about 5%-10%. It didn't create any conflict among the group since there was an agreement from the start that whenever several people are scoring the same scene it would be the best one that would win. The movie was a big production, biggest budget for a canadian movie at the time, but because of poor script writing in places, and inexperience of the writers, it did poorly at the box office. It's really too bad because all the reviews about the soundtrack were great. Had the movie lived to its expectation this would could of launch a different career for me at the time, but at least I did get a chance to soak me feet in, and the VSL gig, which followed that, didn't turn out too bad. :wink: That's my story.


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## RyBen (Aug 12, 2011)

Loving the stories, keep 'em rolling! :D 

It's really interesting to see people from all directions. It seems like luck tends to play a big role here, though obviously with initiative preceding it. I guess it's like one person said... "Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it." All we can really do is plant the seed and see what happens.

I think I just found my new sig haha.


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## impressions (Aug 13, 2011)

by gig-you mean decent paying gig or does 'getting a symbolic fee since it was my first time doing films' count?


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## EastWest Lurker (Aug 13, 2011)

RyBen @ Fri Aug 12 said:


> Loving the stories, keep 'em rolling! :D
> 
> It's really interesting to see people from all directions. It seems like luck tends to play a big role here, though obviously with initiative preceding it. I guess it's like one person said... "Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it." All we can really do is plant the seed and see what happens.
> 
> I think I just found my new sig haha.



Luck and preparation.

Getting started is like being struck by lightning so when there s an electrical storm, one must grab a metal pole and stand in an open field.


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## Guy Bacos (Aug 13, 2011)

RyBen @ Sat Aug 13 said:


> It seems like luck tends to play a big role here



Luck once you're ready.


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## Ned Bouhalassa (Aug 13, 2011)

I got my first gigs thanks to my wife (then girlfriend): she studied film at university and some of her friends had become directors, editors, producers. I got two quick TV gigs and thought I was in the loop. Then came 3 years of hardship, with a few things here and there; no one knew me, and it's all about trust. 

In retrospect, it's not getting the first gig(s) that's hard, it's hanging in through the rough, dry patches.


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## Ned Bouhalassa (Aug 13, 2011)

RE: Luck, I like what people like Oprah say, that luck is when opportunity comes knocking on your door, and you're home. I think what she means is that everyone gets chances, but they're not always 'available', can't always see the opportunity for what it is, giving up a low-budget scoring gig for a steady paycheck, for eg.


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## RyBen (Aug 13, 2011)

EastWest Lurker @ Sat Aug 13 said:


> RyBen @ Fri Aug 12 said:
> 
> 
> > Loving the stories, keep 'em rolling! :D
> ...



ROFL. That's a funny way of putting it, but the most accurate metaphor I've heard, along with Ned's.

And by "gig," I just mean the first oppourtunity you had to get your feet wet. It doesn't really have to be payed or credited work.


-Ryan


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## EastWest Lurker (Aug 13, 2011)

RyBen @ Sat Aug 13 said:


> EastWest Lurker @ Sat Aug 13 said:
> 
> 
> > RyBen @ Fri Aug 12 said:
> ...



IMHO, if you're not getting paid, it's not a gig, it's an exercise


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## impressions (Aug 13, 2011)

RyBen @ Sat Aug 13 said:


> EastWest Lurker @ Sat Aug 13 said:
> 
> 
> > RyBen @ Fri Aug 12 said:
> ...



my first film was a chance opportunity i met some old friend(female) who was trying to convince a friend of mine who's also a musician(in a different genre) at a bar to score her senior film.
we were all kinda from the same home town, and he wasn't interested in film scoring while i was just finishing some computer game scoring and was thinking seriously about getting into film stuff. which is exactly what happened, and i had to score stuff that i had no idea about but i was ready to take on anything(musette accordion style songs and soundtrack).

regarding that computer fan made game, these are probably the easiest stuff you can get your feet wet into, getting payed is much harder, it was just by forum posting of sketch they needed and i was in the team.

since then i've done some feature films, theater and iPhone games(mostly low budget unfortunately), which were also stories in themselves. unless you're in a team with a constant stream of clients, the stories are actually pretty nice on themselves.


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## charlieclouser (Aug 13, 2011)

Ned Bouhalassa @ Sat Aug 13 said:


> RE: Luck, I like what people like Oprah say, that luck is when opportunity comes knocking on your door, and you're home. I think what she means is that everyone gets chances, but they're not always 'available', can't always see the opportunity for what it is, giving up a low-budget scoring gig for a steady paycheck, for eg.



What I've always said is, "opportunity might knock, but you'd better be fully dressed when you open the door..."

So that goes Oprah one better - just being home isn't enough if you answer the door in a stained wifebeater, pajama bottoms, and flip-flops, holding a jar of peanut butter with a spoon stuck in it...

:mrgreen:


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## Mike Greene (Aug 13, 2011)

charlieclouser @ Sat Aug 13 said:


> . . . in a stained wifebeater, pajama bottoms, and flip-flops, holding a jar of peanut butter with a spoon stuck in it...


Hey, you've just described my standard work attire! Although the pajama bottoms are usually optional.


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## lux (Aug 14, 2011)

I'm very early and just starting to work better.

What i can say is that after years where i've been told to "do networking" and i sent out emails, packages, stuff, chats all around the world.... 


...at the very end the guy who gave me the best jobs so far had a studio two doors away from my office where i worked as a programmer. I used to hang there when they mixed albums and have fun with them. Then, after a few years, i had a call from him. I also just met another guy by accident when buying a toy to my daughter in a store.

So yes, luck has the major role. But you need to be ready. Working for catalogues could be a way to develop a few abilities.

In todays world is hard to knock at doors. Because ten thousands composers are knocking at the same door due to technological advances. So its always busy, noisy and full of people wherever you go.

Something i'm doing is making people aware of what i do. I recently was able to send a CD to a well established local film producer when i discovered by accident that my bank accounter was his sister...go figure.


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## vancomposer (Sep 23, 2011)

great topic!!!

My story so far, which is a 15 year long already in regards of working as a musician but very young regarding working as a composer:

When I got out of high school I managed to work around as a guitarist one side on different occasions like playing with a Brazilian singer from everything to private party to big company events. He would also hire me as engineer or just rowdy. In terms of sequencing I started writing first peaces with a good old ATARI-ST back then on the glorious Notator software using a Roland JV-2080 and later a Roland VS-1680 hard disk recorder. Man, nostalgia feelings are striking me now!!! . I was seriously considering going to study composition at that time, but somewhat also got caught by playing the guitar better and get out there on tour and do lots of Rock´n Roll!!! After two more years of doing all sorts of smaller things I decided to eventually go to study guitar at Berklee College of Music in the USA. Which is surely a move I would not recommend to anybody these days anymore. After finishing up there with a diploma after nearly 3 years, I moved back to Germany to first set up my own music school to have an immediate income. As a somewhat connective person that I always have been, I would move around in my area sending out demos to people to offer my services mainly as a guitarist at that time. After having some smaller gigs with some well know singers and annually also playing solo guitar clinics for endorsing company at some of the major trade shows, I got to know a lady running some sort of musicians agency in my city. That would sell musicians, dancers etc. for anything from playback bands to also fully educated players to do serious gigs or studio work. Through that I got in touch with a producer that was looking for a guitarist for a band he was forming with a real young teenage girl singer. That turned out to be a very successful band, lasting for 4 years with selling over a million records in Europe mainly, in a time where you start barely sell records at all anymore. Through this I got the chance to do a tremendous amount of high profile gigs with headlining tours, TV shows, music videos for MTV, working even closer with endorsement company in terms of advertisements and developing instruments etc etc etc and learning a lot about the business and record industry. But also about me personally and where I hope to see my own place in a continuing future.

After playing guitar so intensive for many years, a call reminding what my first initial love for music was became stronger and stronger again and that was FILM SCORING and composing! While at Berklee I always looked envy at the scoring guys and remember I took a class with introduction to fillmscoring and music editing. So in later summer of 2010 I sat down an decided after an absences of many years to the world of sampling and MIDI to dive back in an see what is possible today! I WAS ABSOLUTELY BLOWN AWAY! Also seeing my bank statement after a short while, since you get addicted buying more and more librarys!!!  I spent countless hours of trying to get into this new world and slowly learned and tried as good as I can. Somewhere around 2007 I got introduced to a high positioned guy at STEINBERG Software through another friend, because I played guitar on a famous keyboardist solo record and that was somewhat a ticket to introduce myself. I would always have a great relationship to the guys at Steinberg since we also used plenty of their software like Cubase in the production anyways and I switched to it before. So back in 2010 I would show my first tiny intents of composing and blending my guitar playing into. In Spring I got my first call from them to make music for a small trailer of their products.. I have done plenty of guitar work for like Cubase Demo Projects or some of their guitar VSTs before but I saw this as my first small composer job. Various demo songs for them, a loop library I produced followed after. Shortly then my father, who is a musician as well, would start to produce blue ray discs for a label in our city. Its some of those low budget discs you can buy in supermarkets next to the cashiers, but it would give me even more chances to score music to picture and have it officially released. I am also in the progress of writing music for my first little computer game.

So thats my story till here... its long and short! 

Thanks

Ricky


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## rgames (Sep 23, 2011)

Regarding luck, I think another good line is one from a pro golfer (can't remember who):

"The harder I practice, the luckier I get."

Regarding first gigs, mine came doing arrangements for other musicians. Most of my background is in performing, so I started off doing stuff for other musicians I knew.

rgames


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## vancomposer (Sep 23, 2011)

really nice topic! Very interesting to read the storys of you and how diffrent they can be!! :wink: 

@ Guy Bacos: now your name rings a bell with the VSL work and I have been on your website the other day! Tremendous work and also amazing piano playing as far as I can evaluate!


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## Gusfmm (Sep 23, 2011)

Ricky Garcia @ Fri Sep 23 said:


> Which is surely a move I would not recommend to anybody these days anymore.



Would you mind sharing your thoughts on this? I'm curious.


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## vancomposer (Sep 23, 2011)

Gusfmm @ Fri 23 Sep said:


> Ricky Garcia @ Fri Sep 23 said:
> 
> 
> > Which is surely a move I would not recommend to anybody these days anymore.
> ...



Well I cant speak really for filmscoring majors but if you are not planning to become the next JAZZ sensation (honestly you might want to be that for some years but give up on it anyways once reality of life catches up on you!) there is no need to go study an instrument in college from my position. With the money you spent on tuition you can buy AN EXORBITANT amount of gear, books, courses, private lessons, seminars etc etc that are much more worth the penny!

I would assume much of that also goes for filmscoring and composing these days... also if I would have gone for composition there is much better and cheaper colleges in germany anyways.


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