Magical !

After 3 years of writing alone on this blog, it is now time to let the other team members have their voice and thoughts heard.

And it also helps a bit to shorten the waiting time until the final release … 🙂

Philippe Rey (www.phreymusic.com) was so kind to write a bit of his experience with working on the score for this project.

Thank you Phil for taking your time and a thousand thanks for enriching this movie with your wonderful music !

And now I step back and let Phil tell his tale …

_________________________________________________________

If one word can summarize my experience as a composer with Ara’s Tale, it would be : “Magical” ! (and also maybe “Nutella”…)

I met “by chance” Martin’s project in May 2010. I was immediately seduced by the magic  (and rigor) which was already emerging from his work at this moment.

I was so impressed that I fastly composed 2 minutes of music for one of his “raw” video of Ara’s Tale, for fun, but with the slim hope of seduce him ! I wanted to be a part of the adventure !

I think he liked the music at this time, but unfortunately (for me) he was already working with another composer. (That day I sacrificed an entire jar of Nutella to comfort me – let’s call it jar number 1)

I continued to follow his project as a fan, and 7 months later, I was very surprised to receive an email from him asking me to finally work with him! I could not believe it ! (this day i had to murder a second jar of Nutella – jar number 2)

Inspiration has never missed me during these months of work, I think Ara has a powerful magic that infuses a breath of love and creativity. I think the problem was even the overflow of ideas !

The first step was the teaser for Ara, where we tried several approaches, then the work on the film finally began. Again, after several very interesting and very different attempts, we have finally understood how to approach the film. The rest of the score was easier to realize, I just had to follow the thread, to let me be guided.  Magical !

At half of the film we took a break. It was time to compose the song of Ara. I knew Martin expected much from the film score, and had a particular attention to this passage. In other words, I was under pressure! (jar number 3)

Like him I wanted a simple but captivating melody. I was initially afraid to
spend weeks on this song, and finally (again), the notes came very quickly, almost from the first attempt. Magical !

I provided the score to Martin, who later worked with Julia (the wonderful voice of Ara) to record the song. The result went beyond our expectations.

We also had to make some adjustments to allow the score and sound design to work perfectly together. Mikkel, our Master of Sound, did a fantastic job. We all had fears that the score and the sounds cannot coexist in harmony sometimes, and finally, again, it worked perfectly well. Magical !

After another break for a few weeks, I came back to work. As in the beginning of the adventure, the end of the score took place on its own without a lot of corrections either.

In conclusion I confess I’ve rarely seen a filmmaker putting as much passion, sincerity, and love in his project. It is primarily these feelings which have guided me. So I think it’s fair to say that a big part of the music was primarily written by Ara, and Martin.

Magical !

Thank you to them, a thousand times thank you.