The Europe In Synch Podcast
The Europe In Synch Podcast
EP19: Heather Guibert (Francium Enterprises) - The Magical Moment When Music Makes The Story.
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Welcome to episode nineteen of the Europe In Synch podcast.
This time we are talking with one of the most passionate and prolific music supervisors working today, Heather Guibert, head of Francium Enterprises and Vice President of the Guild of Music Supervisors.
Her path into the business wasn’t linear. One soundtrack - one aural moment of clarity - deflected her attention from a future in aerospace engineering towards a world of music supervision and literally hundreds of film & TV credits.
In this conversation, we hear how she approaches a job that constantly balances emotions with logistics, stories with rights, instincts with budgets, but where, ultimately, music is the thing that shapes what we feel.
Heather talks openly about the job’s two-sided nature. The creative spark matters, but so does the rights clearance slog. She explains why collaboration always beats selfishness, and how understanding your role in the bigger picture can end up giving you more influence and focus on serving the vision.
We touch on the different mindsets needed for a tight, catalogue-driven music documentary versus a sketch show that jumps across genres, and hear about the small habits that help her keep ideas flowing when deadlines are unforgiving. When a cue lands perfectly, it feels like magic but when it doesn’t, she knows how to break a scene apart, find the piece that’s missing, and build it all back together again.
There's also mentoring, inclusion, and the Guild of Music Supervisors’ mission to advocate for fair credit and compensation across film, TV, advertising, games, and trailers. Misunderstandings about the role still lead to undervaluation, and Heather shares how the guild is working to shift that.
On technology, she is pragmatic: AI and analytics can be tools, but they can’t replace taste or emotional intelligence where, at the heart of the decision, is always the protection of the story.
We recorded this conversation at De Oosterpoort during Eurosonic Festival in Groningen on Friday 17th January 2025.
We hope you enjoy the episode and thank you for listening!
Find out more about our guest:
If you have comments about this episode - or have questions, ideas, requests, recommendations, or general feedback, feel free to contact us at feedback@europeinsynch.net.
Europe In Synch is created, managed, promoted, and driven by several European organizations and companies and is a truly cross-border collaboration.
The goals are to bring together professionals from the music sector with decision-makers from film & advertising to provide a real-life, hands-on, learning experience, and to promote European music in the complex field of synchronization, through communication, knowledge-building and networking via focused mentoring and peer training sessions.
Follow Europe In Synch:
- Home: https://europeinsynch.net
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EuropeinSynch
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/europeinsynch
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/europeinsynch
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/europeinsynch
Intro/Outro music is an instrumental edit of "Gimme" by Daffodils.
They're on Soundcloud.
Europe In Synch is co-funded by the European Commission.
This podcast is a SuperSwell production.
Setting The Scene At Eurosonic
SPEAKER_00Welcome to the Europe in Sync podcast. We're at the Eurosonic Festival in Groningen. We have a wonderful guest joining us today, Heather Guibert from Francium Enterprises, based in LA. Heather is an independent music supervisor, an extremely prolific music contributor towards hundreds of TV and film projects. Heather's also the current vice president of the Guild of Music Supervisors and a solid advocate and mentor for more women in more positions in the industry. Heather, thank you for taking time to join us. Hello.
SPEAKER_01Hello, it's a pleasure to be here.
SPEAKER_00What is it about being a music supervisor that excites you the most, would you say?
SPEAKER_01I mean, for me, I think I was always drawn to the role as a means of connecting a love of film and television and story with a love of music. At the end of the day, the job itself, the craft itself, is really about having a strong sense of music and the impact it has on the audience that's on the receiving end of what you're creating. And there's just this beautiful, magical moment that happens when you take a piece of music and you put it against a visual and how it can change the story, how it changes how you feel, how it changes how you felt about the piece of music in the first place. It's just this really compelling middle ground.
SPEAKER_00So was that the kind of thing that attracted you in the first place? That knowing that there was this form of magic, I like this idea of it being a magical moment.
From Aerospace Plan To Creative Pivot
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I mean, I don't know that I knew that it would be magical at the time. You know, I was initially on a very different path with my life. Music was always very important to me. I was always drawn to it. From a young age, I was like, I want to play the drums, and started taking lessons and luckily being supported in that. But then I also just really started being drawn to the world of artists and performers and songwriting and listening to music. And any money I had was being spent on CDs or music magazines or musical instruments, just anything dedicated to music as a whole, but at no point did I ever think there was a career in it. For some reason, despite playing music, I just only imagined that a career in music was as an artist, performer, or as a music teacher, or playing in an orchestra. Like those were the options, and I had no sense of anything outside of that until truly the kind of moment that made me realize and discover music supervision. It was my senior year in high school in the US, and it was right in the middle of the year where I really had a lot on my mind in terms of like what am I gonna do with my life. I had this plan of going into engineering, and to a certain extent, the plan I had for my life didn't quite work out, and I it was stressful because I suddenly needed to have a new plan, and I'm someone that works really well with a plan. And I was just in my room where I always had music playing. I had this like 50 plus one CD changer, and a song from a soundtrack came on. And in that moment, in listening to the song, the light bulb came on. There is a job for everything on a movie. Someone has to be responsible for the music. I want to do that. And that's the moment that changed the course of the rest of my life, truly. I didn't know what the job was, I didn't know what it was called, I didn't really know what it fully entailed. I just suddenly was like, I want to do that.
SPEAKER_00I love that, and I hear other people talk about that light bulb moment where they love music, they love films, and then one day it just hits them that there's this connection where you can be the person connecting them.
SPEAKER_01You could be the person that's that's doing that. And the really interesting part, there's really no way to fully grasp what music supervision is until you really start actively doing it. Because I think from the outside world, it just seems a little bit different than what the day-to-day reality is, which I would say is true of probably every single profession.
SPEAKER_00But you said there that you had a different thing in mind when you were growing up and studying, and it was aerospace engineering, right?
SPEAKER_01That was ultimately what I was going to get into by the time I really needed to make decisions. I always had a lot of interests and things that I liked and things that I was good at, but I was never fully compelled at that like sense of career, which I think is the more common scenario for most people. So then through high school, I was very good at math, I was very good with science, and had made up my mind I was going to go into aerospace engineering, I was going to do that through the military, going into the Air Force to do that, and yeah, just suddenly in that kind of epiphany moment realized I like that, and maybe I'd be good at it, but it's not really something I'm passionate about. I just couldn't really imagine that being the thing that really excited me to get out of bed every morning.
Left Brain, Right Brain Of The Job
SPEAKER_00Right, and something like aerospace engineering. It makes me think that to do work like that, you have to be kind of creative-minded and imaginative. So that carries through, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I guess I'd never really thought about that, but you're certainly right. And I think just reflecting on who I am as a person and certainly who I was as a 13-year-old and an 18-year-old, I think I always had a bit of that duality, which was creative, but also very logical, very organized. And I think that is partly why I struggled to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. I was good at a few different things, and I wasn't quite sure how to put all those pieces together. In retrospect, music supervision truly is something that's very left-brained and very right-brain. It is very creative and imaginative, but there's also a lot of administrative work, a lot of legal knowledge you need to have, a lot of historical knowledge you need to have. To do it successfully day to day, you're juggling a lot of plates at all times. You have to be very organized. I think it's also important to be a good team player, a good communicator, have a sense of politics. Like you really hit on a lot of different aspects that makes it an interesting career path, certainly in the full-time day-to-day reality of it. And I think a lot of the folks who are very successful at this are able to really balance the two parts of the job because a creative idea is only as good as your ability to execute it. You can have an incredible idea. Oh my god, this is the best pre-existing piece of music. It'll be incredible here, it'll work so well, it'll heighten the story, it'll do all these things, the audiences will love it, but you can't execute it, you can't clear it, you can't afford it. There's legal problems that you can't navigate. It doesn't matter how good the idea is because it'll never happen, and then no one will ever see it.
SPEAKER_00And how about qualities like being self-motivated? You're gonna need that, aren't you, to handle all the disappointments I guess there are along the way. Yeah, I I get a feeling you've not had so many of them, but you must have had some.
Collaboration Over Ego
SPEAKER_01Oh no, I've had plenty of disappointments. Ones in my own career, certainly. Yeah, I mean, it's part of the job, it's part of working certainly in the film and television industry, but there's a lot in the job of being a music supervisor. Something I learned very early on as I was going on this path was, for lack of a better term, learning to check your ego at the door. Knowing that my opinion is not the only opinion in the room, and certainly not the only opinion that matters in the room. Our role is to support the story, support our filmmakers, it's to support the budget that we have, it's to support the distributors and the network and all of the different stakeholders that are involved. Our role is to support that and to execute a vision. It is not this is what I want and this is what I think it should be. And the more you have that sense of collaboration, the more successful you can really be in the industry. And I would even say I think the most successful projects, certainly ones that I take the most out of really feel very collaborative. The weight wasn't only on me to figure out how to solve problems, but it also wasn't I'm just there to execute someone else's vision and feel like I don't get to have a voice. I think when everyone gets to work together and collaborate, you really just get the best music and picture moment. You get that magic we kind of talked about earlier that everyone can feel like they were a part of and that the audience can connect to.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, the term knowing your place has negative connotations, but actually knowing your place within a project can be a positive thing if done properly, because your place could still be a very important part of the overall process, couldn't it?
Mentorship And Everyday Inclusion
SPEAKER_01Yeah, exactly. And and I I like that you framed it that way. That I do think there's a negative connotation when it's said, but it's also very true that knowing my place on a film means that I know not to go to the costume designer and start commenting on what their costume choices are, even if I do have an opinion. Knowing my place is certainly being on a call with our filmmakers, our directors, our studio, and understanding when it's okay for me to express an opinion or when I should sit there and say, I'm supporting my filmmaker's vision, I'm here to do that, or whomever else in the room that I need to make sure that I'm being supportive of. It's very much not a I'm just here for me, I'm there as part of a team and understanding how all those pieces work together.
SPEAKER_00I think accidentally I've segued into something because knowing your place as a negative connotation is something that's quite often aimed at women. And I know that you do a lot of mentorship and have an important role in the industry as someone who is about inclusion and empowering other women who want to do similar things. How important is that to you? How do you use your platform?
Inside The Guild’s Mission
SPEAKER_01It's tough. I'm someone that thinks what you do every single day and in small moments are much more important than what you can do in some grandiose movement because I think how you operate day-to-day, how you treat people, really has a more profound impact and is much more genuine than doing some grand gesture elsewhere. So there are more specific mentorship programs that I've been a part of historically, and those are great and those are important. But I also think how supportive you are of people every single day, folks who want to speak to me, being supportive in that way, folks who want advice on careers, I'm often perfectly happy to do that. It's lending support and being honest with people on the day-to-day, but also then helping to uplift the folks who are coming behind you. I am a one-person operation, never had an assistant, I've never had to directly hire someone. But what I can do is help people find other jobs, help people find other opportunities, help make sure that they're on a path truly to be successful when they're given an opportunity. And I think that tends to be one of the parts that gets a little lost in the chain of how do we get more supervisors in these positions, how do we get more people in this kind of position, is really the best thing you can do is to help someone be in positions where they can succeed. And that can take a little bit longer to get the knowledge and the information and the experience that is necessary to be successful. But I think when you can be supportive in the day in and day out, when someone gets a gig, whether it's a first time as a music supervisor on a job or it's being able to be an assistant for someone or a coordinator for someone so that they learn the process, putting people in positions where they can be successful will help them in the long term versus just here's an opportunity, you're on your own, figure it out. Sometimes we see that in different sectors, and then we act shocked that the person wasn't overwhelmingly successful because they weren't given the tools to be successful.
SPEAKER_00You're currently the vice president of the Guild of Music Supervisors in the US. Did you think that a role like that would help you with all these mindsets you had about improving the business for everybody?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so I've been a part of the guild since really its founding. First, just as a volunteer, then as a member, then being a part of different committees that it's had over the years, and I think it just naturally happened as a byproduct of being really passionate about music supervision and the craft and wanting to do what I can to help advance that craft and that recognition. The mission of the guild is really one of advocacy and education for the craft of music supervision. Those two things go hand in hand. You can't advocate for something that people don't understand, and a lot of what we find is something that holds the craft back is really a misunderstanding of what the craft and the role of a music supervisor well and truly is. So I just put a lot of volunteer time in and put a lot of effort and passion into it, and at a certain point was recommended to run for the board. That was, I don't know, six, seven years ago at this point, I forget. And I was elected to the board and then started serving. So I was operating in that capacity for several years until the leadership at the time was stepping down, and it was time to find who would be the next person to step into the role of president. We were all on the board very grateful that Lindsay Wolfington went for it. It's not an easy job, I'll say that. And then Lindsay reached out to me to potentially be the vice president. So leadership is not easy, I would say, and certainly leadership of a volunteer member organization certainly comes with its challenges. Most of us are based in the US, but it's still a global member organization. We have, I think, members in like 17 or 18 different countries all over the world. I wasn't itching for leadership. It's not something I had my eye on, and it's been much more of a challenge than I think I even expected. But I'm grateful that the membership believed in me and has been supportive of me in that role and certainly take a lot of heart and responsibility in doing my best to continue to advocate for music supervisors and hope to change the landscape of the world that we're operating in.
SPEAKER_00It must be very important to have a guild, have any kind of membered organization, because most music supervisors, or a lot of them, people like yourself, independent, could be marginalized within the industry as individuals.
Power In Numbers And Advocacy
SPEAKER_01Oh, 100%. And even as individuals, there's an impact to working solo like that, being freelanced, but certainly in the larger makeup of being one crafts among hundreds on a film production or television production. The guild also represents music supervisors in video games and trailers and advertisements, music supervisors across all visual media. So we are often one of many, and I think we're still, certainly in the film and television industry, something that has a long history, it's still a newer role and a newer craft. And so there's, as I mentioned earlier, still a lot of misunderstanding of really what that role is, and if people don't really understand what you are, then they don't understand how important you are and how important you should be, and thus why you should be treated in that way and compensated in particular accordingly.
SPEAKER_00How much input do you have then as a guild or as someone in a leadership role within the guild when it comes to addressing new challenges or problems within the industry and you need decisions to be made on how to approach them? I'm thinking of new technologies, about inclusivity issues, things like that. How much input do you have in making plans of how to approach these new challenges?
SPEAKER_01I think it's depending on what those issues are, but the beauty of the existence of a guild and why it's important for music supervisors all over the world to be a part of it is that there are strengths and numbers. And being united together with a cause gives you power. And the more united you are on that cause and the more power you have, the more people will listen to you. But the more you can try to get people to listen to you and take you seriously. And so we see that in advocating for better compensation, we see that in advocating for better treatment as of music supervisors across the world. And I think it's the same for any developing issues in terms of technology, in terms of inclusivity, in terms of how music supervisors are treated in every single aspect. The power is always with the people, whether they realize it one way or the other.
AI: Tool, Threat, And Limits
SPEAKER_00I touched on in that question about new technologies, artificial intelligence is having a quite massive impact on everything. It's a bit scary, creates something out of nothing. What's your take on it as a music supervisor? What's the realities of it?
SPEAKER_01I mean, I think the pragmatic realities are that it's here and there's a part of it that we have to learn to work with. As a whole, it's something that does scare me as just a human being. I would love for AI to figure out how to do my dishes. That's what I'd really like it to focus on, and not taking over creative industries and art, but still waiting for someone to focus AI in that direction. As a whole, I would say these technologies are developing. There are ways for technology to be a tool that you use in your tool chest, just as you do with a lot of other things, in the same way that the computer changed things for us as a tool. The internet changed the way that we would do our jobs. I have concerns about what will happen. I do think at its core it'll have an impact on the career of a music supervisor in the role that it has, and that's part of what gives me some pause. But I also still think that there's so much that's fundamentally important and essential to what a music supervisor brings and their role to a project that cannot be replaced by AI or a computer. And I hope that studios and networks and other industries and folks in positions of power and hiring will see it that way as well.
SPEAKER_00But can having these data-driven tools and platforms that use analytics and can show you audience insights and things like this, combined with your creative energies, have a really positive effect on how music supervision works when selecting music for projects?
Data Versus Feeling In Selection
SPEAKER_01I mean, I would say yes, it can have a helpful impact. I would say for me, it's very dependent on the specific kinds of project and the specific needs. At my core, I'm not interested in data-driven analytics and how to approach a scene. When I'm given a scene that I need to work on and develop ideas for, I don't care about the data. I care ultimately about finding the right piece of music that's going to have the right kind of emotional impact and story impact that I'm looking for. And I've never cared whether it ends up being a piece of music by an artist that has a hundred million followers or if they have two followers. That doesn't matter to me. That magical moment when you take the piece of music and you put it against picture and you feel something. I don't need data to do that. That said, there are certain projects where having a thorough understanding of your audience and what they like, what they need, what they'll respond to is really helpful. Having data-driven information that can help you when you're really trying to target a very specific audience in a very specific way. I do think there are plenty of opportunities for that to help break through a little bit more. But I do feel like at a certain point you can get lost in the data that you lose. What ultimately is the thing that I think we all love about that magical moment of music meeting picture, which is you just feel something. What I'm about to say is very corny, and I try to limit the number of times I say it out loud, especially to people that I work with on projects. But to me, music is the soul of the film or the television series. There's what you see, and there's all of that, and every role is incredibly important. But music ends up being really the soul of it all, and the way that you use music and the kind of music that you're using, and changing that, having it be dry, having one kind of sound versus another really impacts you emotionally. And I don't need data for that. I don't need facts for that. That's just feeling.
Tools, Catalogues, And Clearance
SPEAKER_00Your standpoint then is to use data when it's appropriate, when it gives you additional information that helps you in your creative decision making, but the creative decision-making rules. But what about other people's point of view within the process? Is there increasing pressure from other people that might not have that point of view, wanting you to follow the data a bit more? That seems to be coming into all areas of entertainment and sport as well.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, of course. I mean, ultimately, music supervision is a very collaborative process. The music supervisor very, very, very rarely gets to be the one to make the decision on what piece of music is used. A handful of times, I want to say, in my entire career, did I get to decide this is what we'll use here. Usually there's at least one person or multiple people who are involved in that process of actually being the decision makers. And so, as such, there are many people that we need to please. There are many people who have a stake and a say in how music is used, and they may come to these decisions needing that data, needing an understanding, having a certain goal in mind. Where I think the data analytics are really helpful, where you do want to really target a specific kind of audience, whether that's in a film or television project, or whether that's in branding and marketing. If you're trying to sell X product, there's a demographic you're trying to reach. So if you're able to, through music, touch them and reach them in a way that you may not otherwise, then that data is really helpful. It can help you accomplish that goal. But yeah, sometimes on a project, especially if it's something where they wanted to have a very specific, successful soundtrack where those kinds of pressures exist, then there can be the extra pressure of needing to know your demographic that you're trying to reach and making sure that you're able to do that.
Switching Gears Across Genres
SPEAKER_00What about with tools like Song Trader, for example, that aim to simplify the music discovery process? What do you think of that and how to incorporate it, if at all?
SPEAKER_01It's a useful tool in the tool chest of a music supervisor, and there are many, many very useful tools and resources. Because I would say at its core, I would call Song Trader a resource. In my mind, more than anything else. There are a resource for finding music, they're a resource for having an easy way to license that music in the same way that there are a lot of other companies not to take anything away from Song Trader. But there's a lot of different options of music representatives and labels and publishers and sync agencies who are representing a catalog. And these things are all over the world and other tech resources as well, where you're able to listen to the music, you're able to communicate directly with them in order to license and have the rights granted and work out the money and all those different pieces. So that's all part of the daily job of doing this. And sometimes you're speaking directly to the artist and the songwriter who doesn't have a rep, and so you're working through the process to have a contract worked out for the legalities and the finances involved, and other times you're going through a major company and their team behind them, the folks who work in that day in, day out. So there are hundreds, if not thousands, of these different resources that it's important for us to have knowledge of and use on the day-to-day.
SPEAKER_00I really want to get on to talking about your work actually, some of the success you've had. But you work on such a wide range of projects. They are very different and require a different mindset, a different musical point of view. Where do you start and how do you approach that?
Process Under Pressure And Timelines
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's interesting to be at a part in my career where I can reflect on what I've done so far and have a bit of that view. And certainly it I've worked on a very diverse range of projects over the course of my career, and I'm really grateful for that because I like a new challenge, and I don't like doing the same thing over and over again, which is always something I found interesting and compelling about the job of music supervisor. Every day is completely different, and the problems you face every single day are different. So I've enjoyed doing work in documentaries, I enjoy working in dramas and comedies and horror and thrillers and sketch shows and all these different kinds of genres I've been able to play with because at the end of the day it makes me think of music in a different way because the need and how you use music in those projects is very different. So I'm constantly having to learn and push myself with having new challenges and having different ways of again just reflecting on how music can work against picture. How you use music in a music-based documentary on David Crosby is very different than how I'm using music on a black lady sketch show, which is very different than how I'm using music on the Americans, for example. So it's been really fun and I'm grateful for all of that.
SPEAKER_00How do you approach each one? There must be a different approach to these, from documentaries to comedies to films.
When Good Enough Isn’t Your Best
SPEAKER_01Yes, 100%. So hearkening back to what we were talking of in the beginning of the left brain, the right brain, the creative and the administrative and the organization, certain projects are much more creative and some are much more execution, really understanding the wants and needs of each one. So being able to work on a project like some of the music documentaries have done. I worked on a documentary for David Crosby, I worked on one for Linda Ronstadt, I just finished one for Diane Warren. Those at their core are not as creative as, for example, work on The Americans or work on a Black Lady Sketch Show. But they require a completely different sense of music and a completely different sense of how I need to approach the role in order to be successful and supportive of the filmmakers and the vision that we have. So on a film like David Crosby's documentary, we're gonna be using, most likely, almost entirely music that David Crosby is a part of. So there's a much more narrow playing field in terms of deciding which piece of music when. There's a story that you're telling that you have to hit certain pieces of music. He might be in an interview and just start talking about it, right? But if suddenly it becomes really essential that that one song is now taking up 10 minutes of the story time, my job is to do the best I can to make sure we can get that song cleared with the rights and structure that we need, right? Suddenly that just became the most essential piece of music for us to have in this documentary. And my job is 100%, let's figure out how to make this a reality. That's a little bit different in how I'm going to need to approach it than just coming up with an idea on my own in my own headspace and then suggesting it and hoping I can get it done. So every project I have to approach a little bit differently by managing both what the vision is that I'm speaking to my filmmakers and our stakeholders about, but then also like creative, the budget that we have, the timelines that we have to work with. And so the approach really does adjust for each one. And in some moments, music is there just to support in the background, and in other moments, music is the featured essential way that you are telling an audience something. Now, a five-minute montage moment is very different than a piece of music playing in the back of a bar while two characters are speaking. And so that just really puts me on the right place of where I need to understand how to focus and how to approach each one while also keeping in mind the whole of the entire project and the whole of how those individual scenes add up financially and creatively for the production.
SPEAKER_00You mentioned before the beautiful explanation about the magical moment when the audio and the visual come together. How hard do you have to try to make that happen? Can you plan for that as part of your process when you start a project?
Watching Your Work And Its Impact
SPEAKER_01What's interesting is you never always really know when the magic is going to happen. And sometimes you have to spend days and weeks and months working to find the solution of what the right piece of music is for a specific moment. And there are others where it's the first idea that you have and you just know right away, and you're like, this is it. And I've been shocked over the course of my career when those little this is it moments happen where I only have one idea, and I'm like, here we go, this is the one. I just feel like this is the one. Or sometimes you're like, This is the first thing that comes to mind. Try it, and they're like, it's brilliant. I'm like, oh my god, I'm so good at this. Which is in stark contrast to the many days that you spend really chipping away, coming through ideas and thinking that you're terrible and you'll never work again, which all go hand in hand, and there's success in both of them that ultimately comes out. But maybe on my two hands I can count the moments where I just knew the song. I knew what it needed to be. I could see it in my mind. I'm like, I have confidence that this is gonna be the answer to our problem. This'll be the piece of music that works and the magic will be there.
SPEAKER_00Do you have processes in place to get you through times when it's not coming together?
Glee’s Cultural Reach And Responsibility
SPEAKER_01Ooh, that's a great question. I think the difficulty is that's inevitably a very stressful moment. And self-doubt and insecurity are part of every creative industry. Probably just being a good person and being a human is having those moments of doubt. I think it's just very natural. But I think in moments where I'm struggling to find the answer, and I use the term there's a problem, and I just think of it not in negative connotation, but again, more of my math brain is this is the problem and it needs to be solved. So how do I find the solution to this? And you kind of take the pieces that you know. You take, okay, I have one minute and 11 seconds. What are the beats that we need to hit? I need uh an intro here, I have this emotional moment, 25 seconds in, I have this other beat that I need to hit. It needs to be a little bit more comedic there. You kind of plot it all out. You try to get a sense of it, you try to communicate with your team about what they want to achieve. Sometimes they can communicate that to you, sometimes they cannot communicate to you what they want or what it means, and you just have to interpret based on what you're hearing. And at those moments, I just find you just gotta throw spaghetti against the wall and see what fits. For me, I have to think through the solution. I have to think, let me try this, let me see if that works. No, that doesn't work. Let me try this other idea, whether that's different genres, different instrumentation, different tempos, trying something, seeing how it plays. Let me keep developing this idea and seeing whether the solution will be there. And other times you're like, nope, that doesn't work, that doesn't work. Oh my god, I'm never gonna come up with the thing that works. This is so hard. Inevitably, you always do, either by just chipping away at it, by working with your team, and hopefully you have the time to work through that process. Something we really haven't touched on is so often you just don't have a lot of time. I think as the industry has really changed and technology has really evolved, you have less and less time to come up with this idea that's gonna solve the problem or be the perfect solution to that piece of music that you need against picture to make the magic.
SPEAKER_00But do you have times where the director or the producer is really satisfied with what you've come up with, but you're not. And you might not say anything, but you might know that there's something better if you had more time.
SPEAKER_01It's definitely happened, and I've learned, I haven't always known this, but I've learned over the years, you kind of have to pick and choose your moments of do I say something? Is it worth it? What I've ultimately learned is at the end of the day, I'm here to serve someone else's vision, and when they're really happy I've done my job. If in the back of my mind there's something else and could be better, I try to not say anything yet, work on that on the side if it's really important to me. Come up with a better idea that I can get behind, and then I can suggest that. Try to have a solution before you flag a problem. I think that's a good way of approaching most things in life is you don't just want to say, oh, there's a problem, and not approach that with at least ideas on how you're gonna solve it.
SPEAKER_00Perfect. You have over 700 credits, is that right?
SPEAKER_01Oh, I've probably worked on like over 700 hours of film and television over the years.
SPEAKER_00700 episodes. You have credits in over 700 episodes of TV and film as well, so you must be doing something right. How is it for you personally when you're watching back as a viewer some of the work that you've done? Can you watch it as a viewer? Are you very critical of anything? Are you constantly beating yourself up? Are you generally quite satisfied?
SPEAKER_01I would say for the most part, I don't know that I really watch anything back that I've worked on. Once I stop working on it, I would say. If there's a film and there's a premiere, I'll go to the film and I'll see the film in that moment. But three years later, am I going home and putting that film on? No. I've seen this film so many times at this point, I can play it back in my mind. But every now and then you're at a friend's house or you're at a family member's home and something that you worked on might be on, and then there it is. I don't think I can really watch those things back critically in those moments, but I remember the memories. I remember the stories of a certain thing that happened, and maybe I'll chime in with that. But I would say as a statement, but it's also a little bit of a joke, that once you really start working in music supervision, anything that you watch visual media with music is work. You're no longer able to just watch something as simple as an audience can. You're analyzing it. The curtain has been pulled, you're seeing the frames, you're seeing the scenes, you're seeing the moments, you're seeing what's going on behind all of that in real time in a way that an audience is able to really appreciate the story. And I'm like, oh, they spent X number of dollars on that, or oh, that was an interesting choice for that. I wonder why. You're analyzing everything that you see in here.
SPEAKER_00But there's like an altruistic element to that, isn't there? That you're creating something not for yourself. Of course, it's your work and everything, but this is going out into the world for everybody else to enjoy. Is that something that you're aware of? Is that something that you take a lot of pleasure from?
SPEAKER_01I mean, it's not something I think of regularly, but every now and then, certainly in moments where I'm kind of forced into reflecting it, is moments where you meet someone at a networking event or a conference or just through your life, and they know that you worked on something that was meaningful to them. And those are the moments where you think, oh wow, I did that. I did a thing that actually touched a stranger. I didn't know this person at the time, and it had a positive impact on them. And those are kind of the most beautiful moments of doing all of this. I don't spend too much time reflecting on it. I understand that when I work on something, hopefully people see it. That's certainly the hope. But the wide reach of that, I never really think about. I would say the project that comes up the most for me, that I'm just really grateful to have been a part of, is Glee. And that's certainly the one that was a cultural phenomenon all over the world, and still to this day is something that people will stop me and tell me how that show, that music from that show had an impact on their lives. And it's beautiful, it's moving, and it really forces me to reflect on the power that comes with this role, and also for me a reminder of the responsibility that comes with it as well.
SPEAKER_00Wonderful, lovely. Well, great work on that and everything else. Thanks for taking the time to talk to us today. It's been really nice.
SPEAKER_01Thank you, it's been such a pleasure.
