With all due respect, I A B S O L U T E L Y couldn't disagree with you more.
Luck IS a factor as I said in my film.
But it is not an absolute.
I gave Ben Wallfisch his first job in film music, the minute I met him I knew he was going to be massive.
I used to drink with Dan Pemberton in shit pubs in Soho, the minute I met him I knew he was going to be massive.
What being insanely ambitious, hard working, talented, geographically well positioned and well connected is the ability to shorten the odds of luck falling in your favour.
What being insanely conscientious, productive and intelligent affords you is the ability to capitalise on fortuitous events, meetings, circumstance when they fall.
Lessening the odds so that fortune favours you is the first step.
Ensuring that when fortune favours you that you capitalise on it is the second.
And leading yourself to be able to deploy your skills so you can capitalise on those two key steps is fundamental. Ergo, you have to work your tits off.
I'm not talking about billionaires, I'm talking about composers, and I'm not aware that feeding back the thousands of conversations I've had with composers is an ego-thing, it is quite simply the consensus as I see it.
Sorry to respond passionately but I think your assertion is a very dangerous one when we're talking about people giving their all to be successful and how that can impact on mental health. We have a responsibility not to say things that have no evidence behind them and can be damaging to people who are working their socks off to gain success.
Respectfully.
CH.
**EDIT** I think the key difference here is comparing business-men/women to craftspeople. The paradigm is TOTALLY different. Why can I say this? Because I am a successful businessman and can safely say a series of fortuitous events (actually the unfortunate events were as important as the fortunate ones) are totally central to the success of an enterprise that neither my co-founder I set out to achieve. My craft as a film composer? Graft.
I rarely disagree with anything you say, Christian. However.... I am not just talking about billionaires and their financial success. James Horner built his entire successful career as a composer only to see it vanish along with his life in one unlucky moment of a plane crash
A similar terrible fate that followed Kobe Bryant, Sam Kinison, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Holly, Richie Valens, Roberto Clemente, and others let alone the countless list of others who die well before their time from some horrific illness (Lou Gehrig, Bruce Lee) or unlucky tragic event out of their control.
Mozart died at the young age of 35, Schubert at 31, Bizet at 36, Chopin at 39, Gershwin at 38, Johann Johannsson at 48, Pergolesi at 26, Adam Schlesinger at 52, and let’s not forget Alexandre Levy, Amy Winehouse, Robert Johnson, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain, Brian Jones, Duane Allman, Randy Rhoads, Ronnie Van Zant, Sid Vicious, John Lennon, Keith Moon, John Bonham, and many more. So in the same way one needs to get lucky
to succeed, one also needs tremendous luck to not have a tragic event take it all away from you in a blink of an eye.
There’s also a long list of top composers who succeeded in film and pop music but failed horribly on Broadway as they did not get lucky on the Great White Way ie. John Barry, Adam Schlesinger, Paul Simon, Sting, Bryan Adams, Phil Collins, ELO, and many more. One of the biggest flops ever in Broadway history was Pipe Dream by the legendary Rodgers & Hammerstein, though they aren’t alone as Alan Menken’s Leap of Faith bombed too as well as Marvin Hamlisch’s Smile and Jean Seberg, Alan Jay Lerner & Leonard Bernstein’s 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Stephen Schwartz’s Rags, Stephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along, Duncan Sheik’s American Psycho, Charles Strouse’s A Broadway Musical, Jim Steinman’s Dance of the Vampires, etc. Life in general, especially in the entertainment business requires incredible amounts of luck.
Spitfire may be the most successful sample library developer ever and it’s clear that Christian has gotten to know an enormous amount of super successful composers in the industry. I think when one is so successful and surrounded by the most successful colleagues it’s easy to believe how much all of one’s brilliance and hard work had everything to do with making such a success unfold. Unfortunately, there’s a world of people out there just as talented that are not making it and most likely never will.
How unlucky so many genius black artists have been only to have their music ripped off by legendary rock bands who took over the world years later. Listen to Otis Rush and you will hear the entire signature sounds of The Rolling Stones, Cream, The Allman Brothers, The Grateful Dead well before those bands ever existed. Otis is not the only unlucky black artist that list is very long of super talented artists who did not have the luck to succeed while other artists thrived.
I always deeply appreciate your passion, experience and beliefs and almost always agree with everything you say, except about this one specific point. You can’t find a super successful Broadway producer who does not believe luck plays the most important factor in why a show succeeds or fails regardless which A-list superstars are enlisted to craft that production. I’ve spoken with almost all of them and they will all tell you privately the same thing regarding the preeminent importance of luck. If a composer’s first show is a failure he won’t get a second chance in theatre and his career is over in that arena. 80% of all musicals fail and all the A-list composers, directors, writers, actors and producers can’t change those odds no matter how talented they are and how hard they work. 60% of all movies fail for the same reasons just as 90% of all record label artists lose money for the record company. Talent and hard work cannot change these daunting realities.
Life requires tremendous luck regardless how passionate, ambitious, persistent, hard-working, determined, talented, educated, intelligent, charismatic, good-intentioned, well-connected, and earnest one is. Melville did not succeed in his lifetime neither did Van Gogh, and they are not alone as genius talent not recognized while they lived. And, though there are many very talented people who do succeed, many others succeed that are not necessarily genius or that talented be it directors, producers, writers, composers, etc. I know you believe cream rises to the top, but there’s an endless list of failed movies, albums, songs, tv shows, books, plays, musicals and other works created by the top of the A-list of writers, directors and composers that begs to differ. I’ve seen fabulous movies and shows that were total failures at the box office while there are huge smash hits that IMHO I thought were dreadful.
I think it’s important for any composer that wants to enter this industry be prepared to face how difficult it is to achieve success as a media composer. It’s not impossible, but given how few will make it, it will be nearly impossible to attain success. For instance, if only 1000 out of 1 million composers will succeed in this industry then that means 999,000 composers cannot make a steady living in this business let alone any money at all. Those odds are so stark that breaking through and becoming one of those 1000 composers is not just highly unlikely to happen but nearly impossible to overcome. I strongly suggest that a composer only pursues this career if they cannot fathom any other possible career path because of how difficult it can be to make a living in this business.
Yes, I know you think luck plays some kind of a factor in a composer’s success so I realize you are not stating that luck is completely irrelevant, but I think luck plays a substantially more significant role in attaining major success than you do, that’s all. FYI I adore Spitfire’s libraries (own just about all of them), love watching your YouTube channel, and love your music! Always wishing you and the people you care about continued good luck
in all things
Your friend ☮
*I am a little bit older than you, but a long long time ago in a galaxy far far away I used to believe cream rises to the top just like you, and that even though one had to be a little lucky in life to gain success, talent, skill, drive, integrity, determination, charisma, persistence and innovation were all way more important than just dumb luck. I learned the hard way over and over again that this is sadly not true, the world is not a meritocracy either. It’s unfortunate that it’s always better to be lucky than smart. Chuck Norris used to say luck is 98% hard work, that’s true in martial arts
and becoming a world class musician, that’s not true in becoming an A-list composer. I’ve met some unbelievably talented composers, some highly trained with PhD in composition from the top music schools on the planet and others with no formal music training, and the only thing they have in common is they will most likely not become successful film and tv composers unless a substantial amount of luck engulfs their careers. Sadly, justice does not conquer all and a consistent dose of positivity cannot simply manifest these kinds of pursuits to happen no matter how hard one tries in every imaginable way to succeed. All a person can do is try their best in life and let the universe do the rest.
reverb.com
And look around you - BLM reminds us of the contingency of being born white, male, cis etc., the world is suffering from the contingency of COVID, and the fate of impending climate change promises to smite us for our hubris, despite all of our hard work and achievement. But it is folly to disagree with Henson about success (I say this without irony), even though, logically his argument is extremely weak. Again, each example provided, Jobs or the people who stay successful, has already filtered out the vast majority who have followed the same path, performed the same actions but failed. But at least this observation makes for a wonderful paradox.
from the fridge is a plan almost anyone can succeed at 100% of the time. However, planning to become the next Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Albert Einstein, Napoleon, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Pablo Picasso, Mick Jagger, or Hans Zimmer are not even remotely as easy to achieve no matter how hard one tries. The whole world of 7.8 billion people would love to be rich, yet only 2,825 individuals have achieved billionaire status owning more wealth than 60% of the world’s population combined. The richest 26 individuals alone have more wealth than 4 billion people combined. It is typical for successful people to believe that their cunning, wisdom, talent and hard work was the prime factor in determining their own success, but that is their lower mind and ego embracing a notion that does not account for God’s grace and how fragile human life is. So much tragedy can derail anyone from success in a second.
was high Art 🖼? Alexander Graham Bell and Nikola Tesla were equally genius inventors, yet when Westinghouse refused to acknowledge their royalty agreement with Tesla only Bell became a household name throughout the world and financially successful while Tesla spent his life penniless, in debt and eventually homeless. After what I’ve learned through studying metaphysics, I truly wonder if Free Will even exists or perhaps it’s a mere illusion as well. I would assume this is a hard concept for most to wrap their head around as it used to be for me too. Even though I am expecting you will disagree with me, I think you are a wonderful person 
