It took me three weeks to write the 'Rhapsody in Blue.' I had always wanted to write something blue and Paul Whiteman inspired.
I'm a romantic singer. That's my nook, my motif.
I think a melody is a melody. And the way I usually start is I start writing my themes without even writing to picture to just try to find the tone for the movie or the TV show.
The thing I realised about composition is, we remember most composers for four bars of music. Four singable bars of music. Pretty much any major composer from Debussy to Ravel to Mozart to whoever else - you can kind of hum it.
You would find in a lot of Zep stuff that the riff was the juggernaut that careered through and I worked the lyrics around this.
Sometimes a chord on a guitar will somehow spur some thought in your head, and you will write a song about it.
I believe very strongly in having melodic hooks, whether they're short or intricate, that you really remember in a movie.
The way I see it, there's only one melody for any song.
I always think it's important to choose your initial theme very carefully because you're going to be married to it for a long time. You might have to generate an hour's worth of music from a very short, little piece of theme.
So when I wrote 'Down' - when I sang the melody, I sung the word 'Down' for no reason. I don't know why. That's how I came up with the medley. I was like, 'I don't know why I said down, but we got to write a song around it.'
I'm a melody guy. To me, that's a musical souvenir people take from a movie. They remember a theme or a feeling, and if they've had a good or bad experience it evokes that sensation whenever they hear it again.
I love the name 'Stella McCartney.' It's a beautiful name the way it rolls off the tongue. A couple of years ago, I wrote a cello concerto and used that as the basis for the rhythmic and melodic structure of the main motif of the cello part.
What came to me as a revelation was the use of rhythm in developing an overall structure in music.
The composition of a single melody is born out of a bit of text, perhaps the first line, but it can also be the entire strophe; it can even be the poem's overall form.
A good theme - like the 'Pink Panther' or 'Baby Elephant Walk' - can work all the way through the picture, which is what I did with them. So, for me, a good melody is not just a pretty tune.
The first thing that inspires any song is a chord progression. When I have one I really like, I get into the lyrics even more.
But over a period of time It's the melodic things that are in my head all day.
I have songs that define characters from each film of mine. It can be a song from that particular film or something that just goes with the wavelength of the film; you listen to it, and it gives you that rhythm. I can't articulate how it helps, but it somehow gives you an understanding of the character.
Composing music for 'Mungaru Male 2' is a big responsibility and challenge.
There is a moonlight note in the Moonlight Sonata; there is a thunder note in an angry sky.
If there's a strong melodic thing somewhere, whether that's in a vocal or in a guitar part or a sample. Something that sticks in your brain, that seems to be something that works.
One of the arrangements I'm really proud of is '21 Guns' because the chorus has this descending bass line with a suspended type of progression that immediately screamed 'Bach' to me.
Composing is to think. It is to have your mind trying to find what is the best sound that the movie is going for: the best melody, the best texture, the best structure and dramaturgic arc for the film. Then you discuss that with the director. He's the leader. He's the one showing you the path to follow to find the soul of the film.
A riff can take on the aspect of a chorus in a listener's psyche.
I think possibly the first film that has music as its leading character.
