The Life and Times of an Indie Film Composer - Part 3 - You Are Not Alone

I should mention that I began this blog mainly for composers but now it's being syndicated to other place. The perspective is fairly slanted and hopefully this entry will alter things a little.

***Indie Film Composers, You are not alone***

I'm not the most social with fellow film composers, it's not that I don't like them personally but I compare other film composers to my buddies at music school...and your not as fun. All the talk about revolutionizing music performance, notation or harmonic philosophy is replaced by royalties, ASCAP and the industry pecking order. I prefer the company of film makers. Someone, who might call up and invite me to a screening at the Egyptian, point out a film I might like at the LA Polish Film Festival or come over with a DVD of some film from Madagascar.

When you socialize mainly with fellow composers and an echo chamber effect results. What once was a little insecurity morphs into GETTING SCREWED!!! And everyone else is getting their due, all that is left to the composers are small scraps and the bones of what once was a ripe carcass of a budget.

This perspective gets more and more twisted and the result is that one becomes more and more bitter. And that is not a good place to be, mentally.

But when you have a more rounded social group within entertainment and especially the indie world you realize; You are not alone. Editors, DPs, Make up artists, Actors, everybody wishes they were making more money and they all think that the other got a little better share of the pie. They know it's not based on reality and they also have the same networks within thier own click that are echo chambers souring the stew.

What about those directors and producers? You say they can't be in the same boat? They are, really! I know filmmakers that are in their mid 30s that live at home with parents, have their spouse/boyfriend/girlfriend support them, I've know film makers that actually were homeless weeks after finishing their film.

I'm not joking, HOMELESS.

Somehow most film composers I know have pretty sweet digs with thousands upon thousands of dollars worth of gear. I've never figured out how they afforded those Genelec monitors on indie budgets! I would guess from the studios I've seen in this town, composers are doing pretty damn well.

What am I missing? Homeless directors and composers with Neve preamps!