Music plays a major role in conveying a commercial message. Composing music to accompany camera footage is like solving a puzzle. The pieces must fit. Composers often have to create a complex passage of sound; the music weaves in and out till it hits the exit. This musical puzzle has lots of approaches in which it can be solved. A composer must not only fix the puzzle but also have the solution approved by the client.
Basics of Underscoring
To start with a composer has to answer a few crucial questions :
- How will the people respond to the emotional content of the music?
- When should the music start off and end?
- What instrumentation is most suitable for the musical target?
- what's the emotional tone of the film ?
- In what way will the resources used be dependent on the budgets ?
These questions have to be answered by the composer while keeping the agency creatives in loop.
Jingles and Background Score
The term underscoring, though sounds alien even to seasoned musicians, simply refers to the instrumental background music that is composed in order to accompany some sort of a footage. Wether film, tv or documentry.Many a times Vocals, mostly without words and phrases and in the form of vocal choruses, are often applied as a part of the orchestration primarily to increase power and richness.
It's very important that background music should be ‘‘felt and not heard.’’Meaning that the score should be unobtrusive and should accompany the film in such a manner that it provokes the ideal emotional response from the audience. If a well-crafted score were erased, the film would lack a key emotional component.
Jingles With Feature Music
That being said, In the case of most commercials the score is no longer merely background music but more of a feature aspect as several commercials consist of minimum dialogue.This can either guide or eradicate the helpfulness of the commercial. When the creatives advise that the composer create a ‘‘bed,’’ they usually are referring to music that is subtle and unobtrusive. However, If the music is a featured part of the overall commercial, there is normally more time and attention allocated to the composition and production of the music.
Not every good writer can write well-crafted jingles. A number of musical styles might match the film but may not meet the expectation of the agency. Some creatives are generally very particular, while most of them do not understand exactly what they want until they hear something that ‘‘feels right.’’It is understandable when underscoring complements the picture. It is only with experience that a composer can build an extraordinary sense of what normally works best with a film.
So To Summarize This primer on Underscoring.
- Be clear on whether the music you create will be in the background or will be the lead tune
- Make Music which is felt more than heard
- Write to meet the need of the creative agency
- Ask yourself questions explained in the first point of this article.
Yogesh Bakshi - Music and Technology are to me what the skateboard is to Bart Simpson and for the better part of the last ten years i have been fortunate ...
