All language subtitles for MasterClass Hans Zimmer Teaches Film Scoring - 25Writing Tips Part 1

John Powell and I were talking about

that sort of the crisis at the beginning

of a movie when we don't know what to do

and just, you know, the couple of weeks

of sitting in front of a blank screen

and going, "Oh my god, I have no idea

how to do this. I'm not a composer. I'm

not worthy. I, you know, it's it's all

over. Um because part of the problem

with music is you don't really know

where it comes from. So what if they

turn off the tap, you know, it's like so

there no there are no guarantees that

you're going to go and write the next

score. And he and and he very simply

said, well, you know, sometimes it takes

a little bit of time to get a movie

under your fingers.

I think this this is what happens to me

when I have to start on a new movie and

I haven't worked in a while, which is

rare because I never take holidays out

of the following reason. It's like I

have no idea where to start. I cannot

write. Nothing comes. It's just a

terrifying blank sheet with a terrifying

desert in my brain. And you know, the

screen looks like a blizzard with just

white on it. But if you write every day

and it doesn't matter what it is you

write, just write something. It's like

it's like I suppose runners, not that

I'm a runner, not that I even know what

a runner is, but pretend I would know

what what it means to work out or do

sports or something like this. I think

you just develop a muscle. And I think

if you write every day, you just get

into the flow of writing.

the way a movie is supposed to work and

it used to work like this in the old

days. Um, in the old days when we had

film and when when people were cutting

on cams and steambecks and flatbeds and

they were cutting films,

there used to be a system in place where

you'd come in, the film would be sort of

cut and you'd sit there with the

director and the editor and your music

editor and you'd spot the movie.

Everything has changed because of

technology and the avid because

there used to be a certain other part to

the system which was at a certain point

they would lock the picture. In other

words, they would make no picture

changes and they would now give the

composer 12 weeks with a locked picture

to write the score. Well, that went out

of the window as as soon as um digital

editing came in. So now

anything can change at any moment in

time with one other thing

that changed everything which is a

visual effect. It used to be the

composer who was late on things and was

holding everything up. Well, the reason

I love computer graphics is is because

those are the guys who are holding up

everything. So they are actually buying

me time. if I just turn the process

around. So now the way I work is forget

the spotting session. Let's just start

if I if I can if I have if if I have the

space and the time available, I start

when they start shooting and I start off

that conversation. I start collecting

sounds and I start making sounds and I

start coming up with ideas and I start

coming up as tunes. And once he finished

shooting, I'm sort of just working in

parallel with the cutting room. And all

that happens is those 12 weeks of the

lock picture which don't exist anymore.

I just put them at the beginning. Now

I write anything between two to five

sort of fully fleshed out diaries and

then there then they're just bits, you

know, where you go, "Oh, hang on a

second. I have an idea. I have an idea

for a love theme. I have an idea for

um yeah like like there was a wedding

march I had to do in this movie. So so

you know that that doesn't require more

than you know just the specificity of

writing that scene. But again just just

to figure out

what the best version of it is, you

know, I wrote a long form version and

then just cut it down, you know. It's

it's actually quite simple, you know.

You you have two types of notes in these

diaries. You have the good notes and you

have the bad notes. And after a while,

you just go and yank the bad notes. And

you just you just have to be ruthless

about the stuff as well. This is in the

tone of the movie and this isn't in the

tone of the movie. And you f and it's

partly that part, you know, that as I

said, you know, getting it under your

fingers is actually finding the tone.

And once you find the tone,

you know, you're not suddenly going to

go into, you know, jazz odyssey

improvisation. You know, it's it's it's

going to be very specific to within, you

know, the the style you've created for

that movie. And, you know, there there

are many different ones. There there's a

there's a Sherlock one. There's a you

know, there was an Irene Ardler one,

which was endless. Um, because I could

never quite pin their relationship down.

But I don't think we ever managed to pin

their relationship down. So I was

writing

music for a love story that never

developed the way I wanted it to. So So

you know, which is okay. You know,

sometimes what you do with these suites

as well is you you give them to your

director and it gives him suddenly an

idea of um how to approach a scene or

you know or or sometimes it's just about

you know wouldn't it have been nice if

we had been able to develop a more

complete relationship and sometimes it's

just nice for myself that I actually go

and

I need to you know to figure out the

character I figure it out somewhere in

the middle of the piece, but I need to

go and, you know, do the autobiography

so I know what that character is about.

And I might write scenes that don't

exist, but that that are just imaginary

in my head just to get to the the heart

of the matter. But this material then

becomes, you know, and I can give it um

to arrangers and orchestrators. I can

give it to other people on my team and

say, "Hey, a second, you know, can you

just do me the string quartet version of

this? I think this tune is solid. I

think, you know, go off and go off and

have a play with it. Um, so the diary

throws off a lot of other bits and

pieces. You know, sometimes it's just

like doing a remix where you, you know,

you mute a bunch of tracks and there's

some really interesting stuff going on

in the background. Um, that in itself

can become a cue. And again, I mean, the

the the the the biggest help in in my

process to me is my music editor who's

sort of not only the leas between the

cutting room and the film and me, but

who is a very creative thinker himself

and something that I knew was going to

be only a love theme. and he suddenly

figures out how to, you know, if you

shove it over an action scene that it

has an interesting effect.

You know, the way I write is it just,

you know, it's like I'm a computer. I'm

just spilling out the RAM. You know, I

just need to know what I need to know

for this project and then it it's all

gone. So, it makes room for for

something new. So sometimes I go and

look at these movies and it's like I'm

seeing them for the first time. You

know, I I learned a lot from

Dark Knight, you know, it's it's

the amount of recording, the amount of

tracks we were at one point, we were at

1,200 tracks of just music. Um, which

was just sort of insane, you know, no

wonder I was feeling a bit wobbly on the

last scoring date. Um,

so by the time it came to Dark Knight

Rises, I was actually doing a lot of the

mixing just,

you know, on my laptop basically and I

would give far more efficient tracks

over to the dubbing engineer. But

really, you know, the person who manages

it is my music editor um to one degree

or another. And then and then one of the

things you learn really really quickly

is you got to be really good about your

numbering systems, your organization.

There's you know when I started out you

know I I lost so many pieces which never

ever appeared again. I mean I I remember

on Blackhawk Down cuz we working in a in

in a serious hurry and and the age of

hard disk recording hadn't quite sort of

caught up with us. So we had this

ProTools system where it took forever to

load. So whenever somebody had an idea,

we would just shoot it on a handheld

video camera. Everybody had a handheld

video camera. And so that became the

sort of a way of, you know, oh, hang on

quick. I got a tune. Just shoot it. Um,

and there's one tune which we could

never find again. And of course, it's in

the making of. And so every time uh you

know somebody's made me watch the making

of the music of Blackhawk Down, you know

uh because it was a it was a really good

tune and it should have been in the

movie. So So you learn at a you know you

you got to be organized. You have to

have people who force you to and I am

not organized. So, so just by admitting

that you know that I have people around

me who uh

you know who celebrate OCD like nobody's

business

for me. I mean for literally personally

um an for me an unsuccessful score is

something

um where I'm just repeating myself

um which doesn't mean that I don't

repeat myself. There are certain

questions, you know, I I think we all

have that there are certain questions

which we've had all our lives which

we're trying to find an answer to and we

just and the opportunity you know

working in film for instance that you

have is

ultimately you're just sort of writing

from your point of view and you're

writing about yourself and you keep

asking the same questions. I mean why

are there so many love songs you know?

Well, people try to figure it out, you

know. So, so if I come up with the same

answer, then I've failed. But if I if if

if I figure out how to just shift the

answer a bit further forward, if I can

ask a new question. Um, and I'm always

more interested in that every score

should actually throw up questions as

opposed to answer them. Um, I think the

question is always more compelling than

the answer, you know. Oh, turns out the

Earth isn't flat, so it's round. Okay,

you know, now that I know that, what am

I going to do with it? You know, um,

look, if you just start with the

character, um,

and let me stay specifically with

Sherlock.

Let's say you didn't see the trailer or

anything like this. Let's say you're

just going to the theater and you're

going to go and see a Sherlock Holmes

film. You're coming with a certain

amount of um baggage. You you you you

think you already know the answers and

the first thing I'm doing is I'm

throwing you off kilter. I'm going it's

got bananos in it. I didn't expect that.

So, so do that, you know, just just but

do it in an appropriate way. It's not

random. It's not anarchy. It's it's it's

figure out how to make the

character compelling by you questioning

everything about him all the time, you

know. Um, and oh, he he did that. I

didn't expect him to do that. Oh, the

Joker did that. I didn't I didn't expect

that. So, so, so that I mean part of the

part of how to ask the question is

you're supposed to do something slightly

unexpected.

That's in itself is a question, you

know, and I think you're supposed to

give an audience an experience. I think

I think that's our job. And I think the

experience isn't to answer the question.

I think the experience is to go away and

the next day go, you know, you know that

bit, you know that bit where it all

explodes and there was that crazy

violin. Why did he do that? Why, you

know, and why am I still remembering

this? You know that it's you would just

want to throw a pebble in and the

circles get bigger until the question

becomes a real question.

We humans seem to like the idea of

symmetrical phrases. So, you know, yes,

your your two bars, four bars, eight

bars, 16 bars, you know, works for

Mozart, works for disco, works for funk,

works for folk songs, you know, and then

you every once in a while you get the

occasional one that steps out of it like

I think yesterday, you know, the

McCartney song, I think that's a seven

bar phrase. It just works like that and

it feels symmetrical and feels complete.

Um, and that's when you go genius.

You know, when the rules are broken

without you noticing the rules, that's

when you know that that's when some some

somebody adds a new um piece to to the

vocabulary in a way. I mean that

and I should try to just play it

slightly slower and a little bit more

properly, but that

thin red line journey to the line piece.

It breaks every rule. You're not

supposed to do this parallel movement,

you know. I'm just moving. Everything is

moving in parallel. Um, it's an 11 bar

phrase and therefore it's asymmetrical.

Um,

for for the longest time it doesn't

quite know which key it's in and it

keeps just repeating over and over and

and eventually the 11 bar phrase

shortens down to a 10 bar phrase and it

just suddenly gives you this sort of

jolt. So if you put that in front of

a music teacher before it was in the

movie, before people went, "Oh, that's a

pretty good piece." An academic

mind would have told you there's

everything wrong about it. So the the

the the trick is is

it's not a trick that but it's the

mission or you know part of the mission

is to find out and maybe this is how I

grew up you know where if somebody tells

you that there's a rule you have to

figure out how to break it because

that's the only thing that moves things

forward. Do I have certain rules I go

to?

Yes. because I want to go and figure out

how to how to break them in the most

elegant way, how to how to do it in a

way that you

sometimes you don't even you don't even

know and that that's very important to

me that you know that you don't see the

hand of the artist at work all the time.

I think that's you just you you just

feel that something new or something

fresh is occurring um

without seeing you know without seeing

the without seeing the horrible surgery.

Three.