New placements (with a video clip!)

The last couple of months have been pretty good to me. I've been getting some regular placements in a couple of new shows, Proving Ground on G4TV and Surprise Homecoming on TLC. In both cases, I'm seeing, or should I say hearing :-) some tracks that I wrote and pitched specifically for those shows. Both of the shows also contain some personal "records" for me in terms of placements. In the Harry Potter episode of Proving Ground, I had the most placements ever in any one episode of a show with a total of 14. And in this most recent episode of Surprise Homecoming, I had my longest placement with a total length of 1:16.

It's a great feeling to be watching the show and then hear a cue that you wrote specifically for a certain type of scene, actually show up in the show AND get used in that type of scene! In this specific case, I'm referring to most recent episode of Homecoming and the "reveal" scenes. I had four cues used in this most recent episode with two of them being the "reveal" scenes. I've posted a clip below of one of those scenes. The cue is used from the beginning of the clip until the family "turns around" and it's a piece that I co-wrote with my dear friend Lydia Ashton.



It's been fun watching these shows with my wife next to me. Every time one of my cues starts I'll point to the TV and exclaim "MINE!!!" with the giddiness of a little kid at Christmas time. Though I've been writing music for a while, I'm still kinda new to the film and TV music aspect of the biz, and so far, the new-ness of hearing my music on TV has to yet wear off. I don't think it ever will. This business is tough and I feel I've been very blessed to see my placement totals continue to increase on a weekly, and in some cases, daily basis.

Some other recent placements that I've had would be in the shows Curb Appeal (HGTV), I Hate My Kitchen (DIY), 10 Grand In Your Hand (DIY) and according to my ASCAP international statement, an episode of America's Got Talent that played in the United Kingdom.

Like I said, the last couple of months have been pretty good to me. Can't wait to see what the rest of the year holds!

Proving Ground sneak peak and Sniper

I don't typically do this but I'm going to start this post off with a viewer discretion is advised warning. Those of you easily offended or sensitive to violent images may want to skip this entry.

I found out last night that the premiere episode of the show Proving Ground on G4TV is actually viewable online at YouTube as a sneak peak until June 6th. So for those of you who don't have G4TV you can actually watch the episode online now. I watched it last night and discovered that I had 5 tracks used in the episode. I'll put a list of them after the video for those interested in knowing which ones are mine. If you want to hear my vocal "debut" then skip ahead to around the 16:40 mark to hear me "singing" about bananas:

1) Thorn In My Eye from 0:04 - 0:17
2) Blues Fun from 2:16 -  2:35
3) Fender Bender from 6:08 -  6:23
4) Going Bananas from 16:42 - 17:13
5) I Don't Even Care from 19:13 - 19:24

For those of you who do have G4TV, the show debuts on Tuesday June 14 at 8pm Eastern and will run for 9 episodes.

Seriously wiped out by crushing cicadas on the ground

The title of this post doesn't mean what you may think it means but if you continue reading all will become clear. But before I do that, here are a couple of updates about some items from my last entry.

First off, the Fantasy Factory episode is now online. You can view it by clicking this link. My cue begins at around the 17:10 mark in the episode.

Second, the "Writer's Detour" that I was suffering from finally went away and I was able to meet my deadlines. Barely, but I met them. And now thanks to the detour, I've got a few new tracks to finish in some new styles for me. And now on to the new updates since my last entry...

March Madness!

I don't think I could have come up with a more appropriate title for this entry. As many of you know, I'm a huge Kentucky basketball fan and (most) every year during the month of March they compete in a little basketball tournament affectionately known as March Madness. Well, they're not the only ones dealing with madness this month. I'll get to that in a minute but first I've got a quite a few items to update everyone on.

Let's start with where I left off, and that's with the film score project. In spite of the fact that my main studio computer was down for over half of the project ( It was a power supply issue, and after a poor job by the 2nd service tech that HP sent, I was able to get the machine back up and running by myself later that night), I was able to meet my March 1st deadline.

I can share more about the film now as well. It's a faith-based movie called Decision and it stars Natalie Grant and Billy Dean. I'm not exactly sure when it's going to air but the latest I heard was they expected it to be on TV sometime near the mid/end of April. Once I know more, I'll be sure to let everyone know. It was a great experience working on the film. The production company is planning on shooting more films this year and I've already been told to expect a phone call from them in the upcoming months about scoring those as well. Needless to say, I'm pretty excited about that.

About 15 minutes after I found out that that every cue had been accepted and I was finished with the score, I got a postcard from our water company stating that our usage for the past month was higher than normal. This is where the madness begins...