E.Z. is the second film I've scored for director Alexander Tana (the other is Murder Rhapsody, below). Frustrated at his lack of Hollywood offers, Alexander went off and wrote 26 scripts, one for each letter of the alphabet. He then lined them up on a shelf, shut his eyes and picked one at random. E.Z. is the result.

A love store and courtroom drama (without the courtroom -- the long-lost lovers discuss the trial in which they're both involved), E.Z. had a very unusual musical requirement. Alexander wanted an eight-minute opening montage set to classical music standards and a bluesy, "crying in my drink" ballad. Alexander wrote the lyrics, and I set it to music. Eytan Myrsky provides the vocals.

E.Z. Overture
The Greatest Love

Laura Smiles was very well received at the TriBeCa Film Festival, and it won Best Film at the Vail Film Festival. The score consists mostly of bowed vibraphone and mixing bowls of various sizes played with soft mallets -- that's really it. Although vary bare, the music suited the story of a suburban housewife who slowly loses her mind and retreats into her past.

Let's Talk About Me
Cleaning the Bathroom
Space Supermarket
Dreams
Streets are Plowed
Sleeping with Paul
Lots of Men
Hit and Run
Back in NYC

Dead Dog started for me with a well-known tango by Albéniz that the director thought captured the spirit of the film. He wanted the rest of the score to reflect it, so I wrote a small score for violin, cello, piano, guitar and harmonica. The Albéniz piece makes a few apppearances in various guises (a country music tango?).

The score was recorded in the lovely Bennett Studios in New Jersey with Barry Finclair handling the sometimes virtuosic violin parts.

Main Titles
Proposal
Dead Dog
Looking at Photos
In Bed
Drive to Rye
Detective Edwards
Marquet Estate
Flirty Walk
Roll Over
Dead Husband
The Search
Local Police
Everybody Tango

Murder Rhapsody was an early experience for me making a lot with a little -- lots of music with few resources. This was in the days before samples were very good, so a lot of it is pure invention with piano, guitars, voices and lots of percussion.

Main Titles
Trysting Place
Another Walk
False Murder
Two Brothers
Crazy Drums
Big Love Theme
Walk into Trouble
Digging Own Grave
Thinking on Bench
End Game Oratorio

Mule Skinner Blues is a documentary that follows the artistic aspirations of the residents of a Florida trailer park. Some want to be rock musicians, one a horror writers, and another wants to dance and wear a gorilla suit. The film ends with the triumphant premiere of their horror film Turnabout is Fair Play.

Beanie's Mayport Tour
Time to Start Shooting
Larry the Collector
Getting Things Done
We Did It

This documentary takes a look at the hijra community in what was then called Bombay. The film won the Best Documentary award at the New York Lesbian and Gay Film Festival.

Most of the score I recorded was sitar improvisations by Amit Chatterjee, but I did compose a few pieces to fit the montages. Here is one of people going to work in the morning.

Bombay Workday

This film is a kind of wacky version of Soapdish. I was able to record half the score in London with the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields. The other half is comprised of salsas, bossa novas, funny vocal effects, etc.

Main Titles
The Auditions
Neely Loves Tonio
The Shrine
Mexico Dreams
Milo's Theme
Look at Me
Bike Ride
Tonio's Visit
Moving Day
Heartbreak Weepy
A Little Killing Music
Ant and Elephant
Strip Tease
Heartbreak Violin
Life Goes On
Waiting for a Date
Walking the Streets
Sunday Kiss
The Plot
Studio Tour
The Wedding Dress
On the Run
Milo is Evil
A Love Fulfilled
Lotte Has a Gun

This score was recorded at the Kampo Cultural Center on Bond Street with a group of about 13 jazz musicians. The styles run from Dixieland to shuffle-rock to blues to salsa to a Russian-flavored anthem.

A Happy Family
Street Saints
Courthouse Shuffle
Urban Latin Love
Two Peas in a Pod
Tom Takes Over
Seance
Get the Gun
Tom's Theme
Tom Alive
The Consumer's Anthem
The Deal
Three Women Sleep
Evil Tom in Bed
Elizabeth Takes Action
I Like Canned Fruit
Mary Ann's Dream
A Bad Day at Work
Elizabeth Wants Rest
Latin Groceries
The Night Shift
The Total Shit Future
Tom Leaves
Nora's Song

This documentary looks at a cooking program in a Philadelphia high school that helps underprivledged kids get ahead.

This was a fun film to work on, and it had a big bundle of creative music editing. One of my proudest moments was at the mix when Bob, the co-director, asked if I could provide a steel drum song for a scene in the subway. I didn't even have a steel drum sample with me, but with some quick internet surfing and fast, laptop composing I had a piece ready within an hour.

Most of the music in this documentary is the parody songs of the title performer, a drag queen who describes herself as the love child of Dolly Parton and Peter Criss (of KISS).

In England this film is known as Magic Roundabout. The extensive re-editing for the U.S. version left some big gaps in the music track, so I got to compose some sizable chunks of the film. I also had to reference melodies of the various pop songs that were added.

French Candy Cart
Sam Marches
Snail and Ermatrude
Doogal Alone
The Moose
The First Diamond
The Iceman Roweth
Tribal Drums
The Third Diamond
Skeleton Attack
Into the West
Frozen Flo

This was a very enjoyable movie to work on; most of my contributions were in the form of sound effects, which took on a musical quality. However, there was one cue that was needed -- an arrangement of Kool and the Gang's "Celebration" for the conclusion of the final soccer match.

They needed background music for an upper west side Manhattan cocktail party, and I happened to have some leftover jazz that I wrote for another Miramax film. I repeated the same trick for a Manhattan cocktail party scene in Personal Velocity. Clearly movies need more Manhattan cocktail party scenes.

The Tadpole Waltz

I reused a cue I wrote for a short film for a cocktail party scene in this popular Sundance winner.

Gallery Opening

My friend Stuart Burkin directed this movie about rural farmers who turn to growing marijuana to survive (not really a teen drama despite the poster).

Tokin' Steps

The melody of this cue I later re-used and re-orchestrated at the director's request for Mule Skinner Blues.

Henry Comes Over

There was a rather funny scene in a posh wine bar with Steve Coogan that needed some cheesy background jazz. I wrote four quick pieces in about an hour and recorded them with a sextet at the old Edison Studios in New York. The one I call "Wine Bar" is in the film.

Wine Bar
Clam Bake
Here's Johnny
The Tadpole Waltz

This cue was written for a scene of Polly Walker and Vincent Perez dancing to a brass band at an outdoor street cafe in Spain in the 1930's.

Spanish Square

Love in the Fields

It's a bit of a stretch to include this one in my "contributed cues" category, for I'm not really sure what happened to my work. Like many Miramax projects, I worked on it intensively for months with minimal input from the filmmakers, then it went away again. However, I wrote a nice temp score in an Irish folk style that I recorded in a friend's loft in SoHo. I played all the instruments myself (except for the fiddle) with the idea that I would someday re-record it with real Irish musicians. Alas, someday never came. The music still has charm for me, like the memory of a lost summer romance.

Main Titles
Da Leaves
Love Theme
Gorse Fire
The High King
Through the Window
Off to College

A ten-minute film about a woman who returns to her evangelical mother in Florida and promises to give up smoking if her mother will go on a diet. A bowling alley scene has some over-the-top country music, while a diner scene has some background music that was inspired by a visit to my optomotrist's waiting room.

Country Bowling
Restaurant Muzak

A Russian woman fleeing an abusive husband stumbles into an Egyptian restaurant in Queens and befriends an ernest, virginal man.

Second Eqyptian

Alone is a very handsome film that began when the director heard the old East German national anthem. That song, written by Hollywood composer Hanns Eisler, features prominantly in the score, as does an unusual instrument called the Cristal Baschet, which is a sculpture of glass rods and steel plates played with wet hands. Thomas Bloch, consider the instrument's preeminent virtuoso, performed his part in Paris.

Alone Main Titles
Evictions
Long Walk Home
DDR Dinnertime
Nightmare
Pool Girl/DDR Waltz
Snake
Anya's Hallways
Cowboy Attack
Snake Attack
Hairbrush
Lonely Man
Doris Day and the Rock
Romantic Ferry
Waiting for Anya
DDR Revised
Home Alone

The Portrait, starring Tammy Grimes, was set among photographers in Los Angeles, so it seemed somehow appropriate to have a score in the "West Coast Jazz" style of Shorty Rogers, Dave Brubeck et al. It was also just fun to write in that manner and to record it with a talented octet (with French horn and bassoon) at the Edison Recording Studios on Broadway.

Main Titles
Theme
Walking Bass
Sad Notes
Photos
Leica
Simplify Your Life
Bassics
Camera Store
Playground Fun
Gallery Opening
Closing Credits

A follow-up to the successful I Am Beautiful, below.

Make or Break

A follow-up to the Breasts documentary.

Dating
Girls, Girls, Girls!
Alt Main Titles
Groove
Fellation
Performance
Time's a' Wastin'
My Friend John
Size
Health
Ecstasy
Sexy
Disease
Spaghetti Western
Getting Old
Tightrope
Privates on Parade

For this documentary about female self-esteem, I recruited the talents of four singers -- Holly Palmer, Keishera James, Elizabeth Kantamanou and Jen Chapin -- and had them "narrate" each of the segments with vocalise. You can hear all four singers in the closing "My Cheering Section."

Hi Mom
My Cheering Section

This documentary chronicals the two directors on a bicycle ride across the country to raise money for breast cancer research. The music was recorded at the now defunct Hit Factory. Toby Williams helped me write the lyrics and sings the songs.

Main Title
Mystic Dance
Camp Fire
Desert Southwest
Barbequediddly
Finish Line
I'll See You

Main Titles
Wolf Whistle
Wa Wow
Bra Montage
Transition
Lolita
Naooom
Happy Dance
Bow Boow
Childhood
March
Aging
End Titles