HOW I MAKE MUSIC

PHILIP

Hello everyone, we are working hard on the second part of season three and are on schedule to be back in April, in under two months. If you're a $5 patron there's also a full length bonus episode coming out before that. What you're about to listen to, is an episode that was originally recorded for the podcast How I Make Music, a show that explores the music and musicians behind Audio Dramas. Last year, our composer, Fredrik Baden hosted an episode, and talked about the Amelia theme, and its many variations. We thought you might be interested in this, so we'd like to thank John Bartman of How I Make Music for letting us share this episode with you. If you like what you hear, and are curious to hear from other composers, you can check out How I Make Music on your pod catcher. So, without further ado, here is Frederick Barton's episode of How I Make Music.

THEME TUNE

FREDRIK BADEN

The piece of music we're listening to in the background is called The Amelia Project Theme. It is a fun and eccentric piece that was written for the dark comedy audio drama The Amelia Project written by Øystein Ulsberg Brager and Pip Thorne. Today we'll break it down and look at some of the insight into why, and how this music was made. You're listening to How I Make Music, where behind the scenes musicians, get to tell their own stories. Every Wednesday we break apart a song soundtrack or composition and investigate the insights into how it was made. My name is Fredrik Baden. I'm a composer from Oslo, Norway. And this is How I Make Music.

Welcome back to How I Make Music. This is Episode 71 by me, Freddy. And thanks for listening in. I come from a really creative family. Maybe the more defining points in my life was making music for an ensemble in high school. In the graduation we play that piece, and the reception was something very heartwarming for me. Something that makes me choke up sometimes when I think about it. Here, take a listen.

MUSIC.

THE AMELIA ANSWER PHONE

Congratulations. You've reached the Amelia project.

FREDRIK

The Amelia project is eccentric and weird comedy and drama, which is about a secret organisation that fakes its clients deaths.

THE AMELIA ANSWER PHONE

If you hesitated, do not proceed.

FREDRIK

Give them the possibility to reappear with a new identity. And it could be anything from eccentric cult leaders or scientists or politicians or we even had an AI, at one point.

INTERVIEWER

...provided you have feelings.

SIIRI

I am programmed to assimilate and display feelings.

INTERVIEWER

Do you feel?

SIIRI

You are not my therapist, you certainly are a fascinating, ahhh... woman.

SIIRI

Thank you. Do not hit on me.

FREDRIK

They're all desperate to disappear. The only way to get the services of The Amelia project, is that you have a really interesting story to tell. And that's how they choose you. So in today's episode of How I Make Music, we deal with the version 7.6 of the musical theme for The Amelia project, and I'll explain more later about why it's version 7.6, but just be aware that there are many versions of this musical theme.

My girlfriend and I watched Dirk Gently on Netflix, and I liked the music so much that I wanted to find the theme tune, and the soundtrack on online. And I searched for it, but then I got the British version, the BBC version.

And I, I kept that in mind for making this theme later so it kind of shares the same ricketi-racketi sound sound. It also reminds me of Fixture, the TV show. With the morning routine, which is played at the start off every episode, which is also this feel of some ominous weirdness, I guess. So I was approached by a Øystein, one of the writers, he wanted me to write the theme, we started talking about what The Amelia Project was I started sending versions to them. And they kept kind of saying, no this is too serious, or this is too... this really doesn't really hit the mark about how silly this show is. My family has a cabin down in Fredrikstad. Which is funny because it's "Frederick's Place". And we have peddle organ there, where you have to use your feet to get some sound. I just made this oompapa three fourths rhythm, bounced it out and sendt it to them, just to find an extreme where of course they're not going to go with this because this is way too silly. And then they just "yeah this is perfect, just develop this".

Big sound with a big melody and big drums and big bass. And then try to offset that with some plucky chords, Piccolo flute, and some really honky strings. So I've made a few versions of this now trying to suit the story of that particular episode so we have an episode, which is about a fun-fair park that is called Hell, so I made a metal version of it.

There's about these two Italians, and I tried to make this mafioso Italian version.

And then there's this Egyptian one where they... I can't really say it because it's a friggin spoiler alert! And we were in Scotland so of course we need bagpipes. And we had a Christmas special, and I wanted to Frank Sinatra the shit out of it. (LAUGHS) I can't say that can I.

So this is why I kind of have to use this numbering system.

We really love to collaborate with others and challenge ourselves, and for World Audio Drama Day in 2018, we collaborated with none other than four other audio dramas. So I Frankensteined all of the themes into one theme. It went like this. I completely butchered them, but it was really a lot of fun.

One of the key aspects of it, I think, is the opening, which is just this beat. To make suspense. This theme is in F minor so I... I set the beep to be in C, kind of feel of landing when you start the theme. Up there and up there and up there and then the theme crashes in and so I kind of liked that.

There are five layers to the keyboards in this theme tune. Strings are very prominent with their bitey sound. And there's roads. And there's the accordion, which gives a nice touch and a dream piano to fill out the top end. And some bitey harpsichords, and a Mellotron that comes in the B part for the dreamy kind of filling... filling out the gaps.

And all of these are playing different notes in the chords. It's easy to copy paste and then you everybody plays the same, but he doesn't really fill out the frequency spectrum.

So the drums are using a lot of subdivision emphasis to keep the momentum going. Everything else is very... oompapa, oompapa. Even though they're going boom-kah, boom.

I, I have a habit of trying to make sense out of weird things. (LAUGHS) When I hear something. Well, why, why does this sound weird? And then I try to find out what kind of chords they are. Oh, it's because it's Phrygian, or it's locrian, or it's C major and then it's all of a sudden, B flat minor that sounds weird.

The chord progression and the scale for this theme is not just normal Harmonic Minor. It's a mix between Phrygian, and locrian, I think, actually, It starts in F minor, and then G flat major, which is in the Phrygian scale. Then back to F minor and up to a flat minor, and that minor third allows to get this tritone field between the natural B, and F. It doesn't belong in the scale. It's really the odd one out. The B section B major - A flat major - G flat major - C major, and then we resolve to F minor sounds off and it sounds weird that resonates, I think, with how this podcast and Audio Drama is supposed to be a bit absurd, and off putting, but also quite funny, you didn't get the piccolo flute fanfare.

And that's about it for this week's episode. We'll listen to the full track in just a moment, but before we do that, thank you for listening to How I Make Music, catch new episodes every Wednesday on Spotify or Apple or wherever else you get your podcasts.

We've been listening to music, featured in the audio drama The Amelia Project.

THE AMELIA ANSWER PHONE

You've reached The Amelia Project.

FREDRIK

To hear the full story or to check out my other compositions check out the link to my homepage in the show notes. Visit How I Make Music.com to learn more about the aims of the show and for bonus behind the scenes stuff for each episode.

How I Make Music is created by John Bartman, and he's a really good guy. For audio experiences that keep people listening contact John Bartman via the show notes.

Because the theme song is really quite short. We're going to be listening to a few different versions back to back. So get out your cocoa, and listen to these different versions of the theme for The Amelia Project in their entirety.

My name is Frederick Bowden, and thank you for listening to How I Make Music. We'll catch you next week.

THEME TUNES.

END.

STING

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