LOST's Final Scoring Session Today

Archives
#1

For anyone interested in the TV show LOST and/or its music, we had the final scoring session today, recording the music for the show’s 2.5hr series finale (to be aired May 23rd in the US). Instead of a normal 3-hour session, today’s session went for 8 3/4 hours! (from 11am to 8:45pm, with an hour for lunch) because the finale is 2.5hrs long and has a lot of music.

They calculated that over the course of 6 years, there was 397 hours of studio recording time, with 50+ hours of music recorded for the show.

All throughout the day most of the orchestra (and everyone else) was taking photos and videos, and a colleague recorded the very end of this last day, including the last short piano cue we recorded (not the final cue of the show; that was done earlier), followed by everyone going up to the podium to speak (Michael, the show’s two head writers, the actress who plays Kate on the show, etc).

If you want to see the video (no spoilers), you can download it on megaupload, but for some reason the system here isn’t allowing any posts with a direct link to “megaupload” – so you’ll have to type it in manually:

Video of the very end of the final day with everyone (best one):
Download at: www megaupload com/?d=O3VRTI6Q

A short video of the show’s two head writers talking at the beginning of the day:
Download at: www megaupload com/?d=9MP361X1

And a video of clips of Michael talking to the orchestra before starting on the final day:
www megaupload com/?d=5MN3UZ5V
(EDIT: sorry, above is now correct for the 3rd video)

Warner Bros scoring stage, May 7, 2010
(Note that projected on the screen, instead of “LOST” it said “LAST”…)

Michael Giacchino
#2

Thanks for that, I am very excited for the conclusion of Lost.
It must have been very exciting to work on such a hugely popular show

#3

I haven’t been watching the show, but I’m very interested in it. What has been happening? Are they all gonna gasp DIE?!

#4

Sorry, I keep a strict “No Spoilers” policy. You’ll just have to wait and see!
Actually for this final episode, they did not project the epsiode up on the screen as we played the music (as they normally do), but it was still on the monitor, and the names of the cues themselves were, shall we say, huge spoilers. It was a really long, but great day. For Hawaiian ambiance (where the show is filmed), someone brought in leis for people to wear, as well as an inflatable blow-up fake palm tree to put on the scoring stage – which fell over right at the (very quiet) end of a long take (at which point everyone burst out laughing). The show’s two head writers were out on the floor for a good portion of the day, and one of them tried conducting a cue himself for fun (with Michael trying to teach him how to conduct). But there was a ton of music to do for this last, long episode, and we got through it all. Some really nice stuff. If you like the show and its music, look forward to it.

#5

have you posted this over at lostepedia? I bet they would love to know it

#6

Ahhh… that is awesome. I can’t wait to see how it ends.

#7

have you posted this over at lostepedia? I bet they would love to know it

No. The only place I really post is here on Pixar Planet. A few years back I posted on the scoring process for Wall-E (in the middle of the “Composer Speculation” thread in the Archives now) and the scoring process for “Up” (“Up Tempo” thread in the Up section), and since someone commented about liking Michael’s work so much on Lost in the Studio & People area, I thought I’d write a short post about the final Lost session as well.

On another note, just a few hours ago the New Yorker Magazine came out with an article on Michael and his music for Lost, including mentioning some of us musicians as well, apparently. The entire article requires a subscription to the New Yorker to view (which I don’t have), but you can see a summary and a snippet. If anyone has a subscription to the New Yorker and wouldn’t mind forwarding me the article, I’d love to read it, though I eventually will pick up a hard copy when it finally hits the newsstands.

Summary of article:
newyorker.com/reporting/2010 … _fact_ross

Nice little snippet:
newyorker.com/online/blogs/a … kes-i.html

[i]When I interviewed the film composer Michael Giacchino for my Profile, he spoke many times of his high regard for the community of Los Angeles studio musicians. Next month, to mark the end of “Lost,” he will hold a wrap party for the orchestra at his home. In my final interview with him, he explained why:

A lot of times musicians are treated really badly in this business. They’re generally not invited to premières, or even to cast-and-crew parties. And you don’t see their names in the end credits. It’s pretty much the only job on the crew where you gotta practice twenty or thirty years to be able to do what they do. Yet so many other people get to see their names up there, including, you know, the guy who brings the doughnuts. Not to diminish the guy who brings the doughnuts! We like him, too! But the musicians are a huge part of what makes a movie work. I always tell them, “Listen, I can put all these black markings on this page, but without you guys all I’ve done is mess up a piece of nice white paper.” So I try to make them feel appreciated. And we try to have fun doing what we do. I want this to be as fun as when I was ten years old, when “Star Wars” had come out and I was playing those LPs all the time and I’d decided I wanted to make movies for a living.[/i]

And yes, we’re all looking forward to the party next month! :slight_smile:

#8

I may not ever have watched Lost, and yet I still find your posts enlightening, miafka. It’s just so cool that you’re actually (obviously) involved in the process, and the score for something like Lost is, I imagine, very important when conveying the atmosphere and ambience of the series.

Do you ever come across particular challenges in these sorts of projects? Scores that are more tricky or different from the norm? It sounds like there’s a lot of banter between you guys as you work which is nice.

#9

Well not so much challenges, but certainly a bit different. In general, doing a movie or TV score anyway is different than doing, for instance, record (song) sessions for artists like Avril Lavigne or David Cook, etc. In those sessions you’ll typically find everyone playing out more since the music (song) is the final product and important. But in a movie or TV score, the music plays more of a background or supporting role – and even if there is a big, loud orchestral sequence, what you’re playing will have to usually compete with dialogue and the sound of cars exploding or whatever. So in general, doing any kind of movie or TV session will be a different type of playing than doing a record (song) date (on Lost especially, a lot of it requires playing really, really quiet).

Of course Lost certainly has its own unique sound. It’s a mysterious show, so the score reflects that. There are themes for various characters and situations, but in general much of it alternates between being very quiet, and sudden bursts of effects (strings and brass slides, various percussion sounds, etc. Emil Richards, the main percussionist on the show, has done an amazing job). There are sounds and effects in Lost you normally won’t find in other scores, but I don’t think it makes it trickier per se… just maybe a little more interesting.

For those curious, here’s a link to some still pictures of the final scoring day:

musicmisc440.webs.com/index.htm

The pictures are not mine, they’re from a colleague’s facebook page. But you can see Michael’s son fooling around with the percussion, the cake that was made, some of the cues we had to play (including the final cue of the entire show – though I crossed out its title until it airs just to be safe) and other stuff. There’s also a cue you can check out (8M1) that was really fast (quarter note = 175, or in the British system, crotchet = 175) with lots of meter changes. Try sightreading that one, folks. :slight_smile:

#10

If anyone’s still following this thread (probably not) :slight_smile: there was an article on the front page of today’s LA Times Calendar section about Michael and the music to Lost (and a live fundraiser to be held soon for a local arts school, with Michael and some of the cast as guests).

It said tickets were sold out in 10 minutes.

latimes.com/entertainment/ne … 1867.story

There are also three video clips of Michael rehersing the (mostly student) orchestra. Except for 9 professionals from the Lost orchestra joining them (as section leaders), the rest are all students at the Colburn school. You can watch them playing three real, recent cues from Lost:

One of the melancholy cues:
youtube.com/watch?v=OILYuJQd0Lk

An action cue with lots of effects (slides, etc):
youtube.com/watch?v=9RvK7TgA1Rw&NR=1

And a montage of playing various cues and Michael talking to the group:
youtube.com/watch?v=TKvr4idL7g0
(and at the end, they all play the main theme from “Up”)