Interview with Dynamic Music Partners on DC Scoring

Hi, this is composer Lola Thirithminis and Dynamic

Music Partners. You are listening to the GeekCast

Radio Network. Ladies and gentlemen, before we

get to the interview of Eliterate Manus, Michael

McQuistion, and Christopher Carter, this following

clip is a medley of tracks from Superman the

Animated Series. I put this together. This is

not an official track. It is made up of three

different tracks from Superman the Animated Series.

It is made up from Batman Shows Up, Train Wreck,

Train Robbery, Alternate, and Kara Flies. So

this clip is made up of those three tracks put

together as a medley to show you the differences

in the scoring for each of these wonderful composers.

Hello everyone, this is Christopher Carter from

Dynamic Music Partners, and you're listening

to my friends at Geekcast Radio. Hello and welcome

to the Geekcast Radio Network's interview of

three very awesome composers. I am one of your

hosts, Steve John -Mike, and I'm joined by Steve

Megatron. Hello. Hello. Today we'll be talking

with... Lolita Romanis, Michael McQuistion, and

Christopher Carter. Hello everyone, how are y

'all? Hey guys! How's it going? We're super.

Pun intended, right? Of course, of course! Is

there any other way? It was a plug. Yeah, yeah,

a plug, yeah. Superbly brave and bold, right?

Well said. Alright, so some background really

quickly. The puns will be unlimited. Oh, yeah,

that's sadly something I can't ask you about

dag nabbit Okay, so some background with this

I contacted Christopher Carter because we are

doing a show called Legends of the Dark Knight

where we review Where we have reviewed all of

the Batman the animated series episodes and now

we're getting into Batman Beyond Originally,

this was just going to be on that feed. Now this

interview will span GeekCast, Radio, our flagship

podcast, Tooncast, Beyond, and Legends of the

Dark Knight, because we have all three of the...

I know you guys have done more than this, but

part of the interview title is probably going

to be the DC Composers. I know you guys are currently

doing Avengers Assemble. So there is that so

Did you really My research did not show that

up because oh, yeah. Well, let's go around the

room and everybody introduce yourselves I was

the first one kind of brought on to Shirley's

grand experiment, and shortly thereafter, Michael

McQuistion was brought on. And I grew up in Portland,

Oregon, and moved down here straight after high

school to become famous. And well, it didn't

exactly happen the way I thought originally.

I thought I would be a singer -songwriter and

have an ambient band and do all that kind of

thing. But then I discovered a love for film

music. And that's pretty much how my interest

got sparked and eventually led to meeting Shirley.

I'll keep it short. We'll expand some more. Yes.

Yes, we will. OK. Well, I'm Michael McQuistion.

I'm from the Midwest. I'm born and raised. And

I was educated in Texas. That's where I went

to college, North Texas State, now called the

University of Texas. And I actually became interested

in film music before I got to college. So I kind

of knew I wanted to be a film composer before

I did graduate work. Well, college work and then

graduate work. I came up to California to go

to the USC scoring program, which was Buddy Baker's

first year of leading that program, which was

terrific for me because I love classic film music

and everything. And he kind of had all those

connections to all the old guys, which was just

fantastic. that course and it was really, really

important for me because I really didn't know

much about how to make film music and that course

gave me those kinds of tools. And after that,

I worked as a personal assistant for a while

to a great keyboard player named Mike Lang who

still works here in town and just a fantastic

studio keyboard player. So I was his assistant

for a while and during that time was when I met

Don Walker who happened to be Shirley Walker's

husband which I didn't even know at the time.

And it was through Dawn that I ended up meeting

Shirley shortly after Lolita had been brought

on to the Batman series. So then I kind of joined

up later on, and Lolita and I met each other

through Shirley, actually. That's right. And

this is Christopher Carter, and I came on to

the Shirley Walker team actually at the very

end of the Batman I made in the series process.

I was actually born, raised, and educated in

Texas. And while I was at the University of North

Texas, which is the same place that Michael went

to for his undergrad, I happened to be in the

orchestra playing the double bass with another

young music student named Ian Walker, who happens

to be one of Shirley Walker's sons. And as a

composition major, doing film music was something

that I was very sure that I wanted to try and...

accomplished after college, and I asked Ian if

he would introduce me to his mother, and he said,

do you know how many people want to meet my mother?

Because this also was during the time that Batman

the Animated Series was happening, and it was

known that Shirley was providing this incredible,

unheard of opportunity for young composers to

get a real credit in the industry. proceeded

ahead. I wrote music for some student films and

I made sure to hire Ian for every one of them

to play on. And eventually he heard enough that

he felt that maybe his mom would be interested

in seeing the work that I had done. And he very,

very graciously opened that door to come out

and meet her and play my college demo tape. And

right after college, she invited me to come out

and join her as an assistant. And I got to kind

of see firsthand what Mike and Alita and the

other composers were doing and eventually jumped

in there and joined the team as well. I think

one thing that I'd like to add to my very brief

intro is the fact that if there are any aspiring

composers out there that want to do what we're

doing, the reason really we even got a shot at

doing any of this was because we had some...

some credibility that we were building already

in the business. I was working in the music library

at Warner Brothers. I was proofreading for big

movies. I was also orchestrating for some other

composers and on big features. And it basically

was a situation where several different people

had come to me to say, oh, have you heard that

Shirley Walker started this new apprentice program?

And would you like to submit something? And of

course, then I said, absolutely. So I think it's

one of those things. It wasn't just like an open

call in variety. Hey, any aspiring film music

composer, Shirley Walker is going to start a

new program. It wasn't like that at all. So it

just was a matter of being at the right place

at the right time to be recommended. So with

my, I did research on all three of you today

and I gotta say it's really hard to find research

stuff on all three of you because of the simple

fact that Wikipedia has an article on Christopher,

doesn't have anything for Michael or Lolita.

No no I'm in there. You're in there but there's

nothing there. Oh no it's huge. Are you spelling

it correctly? I'm looking right at my CD case.

Some people are like, you know, there's all this

stuff about you and all this stuff about your

family and where you grew up and everything,

so it's definitely... Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay,

I'm sorry. Mike isn't on there. That's what it

is. Michael's not on there yet. Lolita, you aren't

on IMDB, but Mike is. No, I am. It's so backwards.

It really, really is. No, it's all there. She's

so there. She's there more than either of us

are there. No, it's pretty easy. Actually, yeah.

We're all three in IMDb, and I know Christopher

and I are on Inuitipedia. All right. So you all

three have said that music was kind of what What

you all really wanted to do was I mean was that

real when all three of you were kids was that

really? What did you say to your parents? Hey,

I want to be a composer one of these days or

did you have? Some other job in law, you know

in your minds the lady you can go first. Um,

I never really thought of Categorizing myself

as a composer. I bet I what I can tell you is

that when I was studying piano all through my

childhood, my mom would be in the kitchen cooking

and she would wonder why she's not hearing the

pieces that I'm supposed to be practicing. And

the reason that was was because I was playing

my own music, whatever I was just making stuff

up. And that was already at age five and six.

I was just playing my own little tunes. And so

I think I kind of was a composer without even

really knowing what that was or making any kind

of a statement. And my sister Birgitta was a

concert pianist, so she was always practicing

piano, and I had a great role model in her. And

the whole family was quite musical and wrote

a lot of songs and whatnot. So music was just

a part of our whole spirit of our life. So I

never really thought I would do anything else.

Although now I'm wondering, gosh, there's so

many things I would love to do. I mean, I love

being a composer, but... Life is so full of wonder

and excitement. I could do so many things. What

about you, Michael? Well, I always had music

around. I studied piano since I was five years

old, and I come from a musical household. My

mom was a choral music director. My sister is

a very talented pianist and singer. Just as a

hobbyist, it's not what she does, but she's just

amazing doing it. So there was music all around

a lot. I did actually a lot of different things

when I was a kid though. My first idea was that

I wanted to be a chemist because I really liked

the periodic table. I thought that was the coolest

thing ever. So I think I'm fitting into the whole

geek idea with saying that. But that, you know,

I decided I didn't want to shut my... This is

the ironic part about this. I decided, no, no,

no, I don't want to be a chemist because I'd

end up doing all this research and I'd spend

all this time alone in a room and it just would

be this lonely career. So, oh well. We're laughing

because, as a composer... Yeah, that's pretty

much all I do is spend all this time alone in

a room. men in tights on the screen, and all

of us are in with the superheros. Yeah, well,

yeah, it is kind of weird. So anyway, there was

that, and then I sort of abandoned that, and

I actually really thought I was going to be an

architect. And so I studied architecture, and

I apprenticed under an architect for two and

a half or three years or so in town, and really

kind of got my feet wet with that, and discovered

through that process that architecture, what

you think is architecture is not really architecture.

It's really just a bunch of putting together

prefab things. It didn't appeal to me creatively

because there were too many predetermined things

involved in building a house and stuff like that.

That's just how it was. I wanted something a

lot more that gave me a lot more creative freedom.

And so I had never written anything until I was,

I think, 17 years old. I'd never written any

music before. And I had taken this very inspiring

trip to Europe as part of an exchange program

with my English teacher and other students. And

when I was over there, I had this kind of epiphany.

I don't know how to describe it, but it was like

somebody just turned on a faucet, and all of

a sudden I had all this music in my head. I don't

know where it came from. It was kind of disturbing

in a certain kind of way, but kind of exciting

in another kind of way. So I started writing

all this stuff down, and... discovered that I

sort of had an affinity, you know, for composition

that I didn't know about at all. I mean, the

first piece I wrote was some crazy like SATB

choral piece with full piano accompaniment. It

was just like, boom, there it is. I was like,

where did that come from? So anyway, at the time,

you know, during my... sort of adolescence, that

was the time we had all these wonderful movies

coming out like Raiders of the Lost Ark and Superman

and Star Wars and I mean just these fantastic

John Williams scores and it was just so so wonderful

to hear this wonderful music and I really connected

to it. I'd also been playing in a theater pit

band for a while with my school and doing some

community theater stuff during the summer. So

I was really loving being involved with music.

That's kind of where time seemed to just disappear

and I didn't Time seemed to just be infinite.

I never could keep track of myself. So I thought,

well, my mom suggested to me, well, what about

this film composing thing? What about how would

you like to write music for film? And I just

was like, well, how am I going to do that? So

we began a long process of trying to figure out

how a film composer becomes a film composer when

he grew up in a farming town. So that's kind

of what got me interested in everything. And

I guess you could say I've been around music

for a long, long time. But I didn't really. make

it a serious thing until I was probably in high

school when I decided I wanted to be a film composer.

What about you, Chris? Well, I actually had to

kind of prove myself. I think my parents were

both very practical, and they thought that being

a composer was probably on the other end of the

range of practicality. So, when I wanted to go

to school, in music, they... question that, and

they said, well, what are you going to do for

your real job? Because, you know, who actually

makes a living as a composer? And I said, well,

I will. And I'll show you. And I did. Exactly.

Exactly. Awesome. What were some of the first

scores that you guys heard that made you guys

say, hey, I want to do that? Oh, gosh, there's

so many. Actually, I think the first scores that

touched my heart were a little bit not so much

in the superhero realm. I was a big Dave Grusin

fan. I loved Jerry Goldsmith. I mean, I only

really discovered John Williams a little bit

later. So for me, I think I loved Planet of the

Apes. I loved, in a romantic genre, I loved On

Golden Pond. Dave Brewson, I mean, but this is,

you know, when I'm in high school. So I was,

you know, I was, I really loved all of that kind

of, you know, dramatic stuff. I don't know. Well,

I, it's tough because I mean, a lot of stuff

that I was doing when I was younger, like in

high school and stuff was more about musicals.

I was more involved in, like I said, pit bands

and so we were doing a lot of musical theater

and stuff and I love movie musicals so I sort

of came from that era and then with all those

other just amazing movies that were being that

were happening during when I was a kid those

like that I mentioned before Superman right Lost

Ark Star Wars all these really epic movies that

had these wonderful themes and wonderful melodies

and beautifully orchestrated there was something

about that that really attracted me too so I

think it was probably a combination of Broadway,

and movie musicals, and John Williams. I would

definitely say that my earliest experiences were

just from the movies that I loved watching. And

it so happened that most of the movies I loved

watching as a teenager were scored by John Williams,

because I was very much into the science fiction,

the fantasy genre. But I think once I got in

to film music itself, I realized that he wasn't...

much of an influence, because I actually gravitated

more towards Jerry Goldsmith, who I would say

is the film composing is one of my heroes. But

also as I got into music school and studied,

I think that a lot of the muses that the great

film composers were influenced by became my muses

as well. Stravinsky, Shostakovich. Tchaikovsky.

Tchaikovsky. Chopin. You know, Richard Strauss

and all those great people. And when you hear

that that's where the iconic film composers got

their inspiration from, it made sense to kind

of go to the source. Awesome. Awesome. All right.

So tell us about the formation of Dynamic Music

Partners. We understood that together we were

a... a lot stronger than we were individually.

We understood kind of the way that the industry

has changed, that the schedules are so tight

and pretty much nobody works alone anymore. And

we realized that by working together and making

it obvious to our clients that we're all working

together, that there was an advantage because

then our clients would know exactly who's writing

their music for them. Yeah, I mean, a lot of

my beginnings were working for composers that

would get hired on a big feature, and he or she

would have two weeks to write 70 minutes of music,

and there's just no way that person could do

all of it themselves. So there is a team. There

was a team back then. And it was a little bit

of a... It wasn't kind of OK to let... the world

know that there's this team that everyone in

the business knew. Of course that person can't

do it all by himself. So even though the main

composer would write most of the themes, a lot

of the actual cues, the pieces that are the big

moments in the film, there's usually a team behind

it, or at least several orchestrators. So coming

from that background and having been a part of

that, I realized that I really love to work with

people that we can all be kind of on the same

playing field and inspire each other and not

have to kind of be serving to one another, but

work as a team and really inspire and feed off

of one another's energy and creativity. So it's

been great. And on a purely financial, economical

level, it's a great thing because we can stay

busy. We have a lot of energy and one of us feels

kind of Like, oh, I can't take it anymore. It's

too much pressure. There's two of us to take

up the slack, or I can go on vacation and just

enjoy myself and let the guys do all the work,

which I like to do sometimes. We all do sometimes.

Yeah. I think actually we had been working together

informally for many, many years because of our

relationship with Shirley Walker. And she had

called out the people that she kind of wanted

to have. be her main music team for some of her

later series. It ended up to be the three of

us and Harvey Cohen. And so we had this simpatico

that we developed in that way over those period

of years, but we never really sort of formalized.

And when we ended up doing Justice League, which

was our first series that we kind of had on our

own, Shirley kind of cut the cord and said, hey,

you guys, I think you should just take this one.

And when she did that, we kind of had to make

a decision at that point. how are we going to

do this? Because it just wasn't convenient or

practical for the studio to be working with three

of us as individuals. So we decided to band together

and do the series as a group, as we had been

doing already. And then one of us said, well,

we need a name. And so it kind of started that

way, I think. We were already sort of set up

for the process and for the workflow. But we

just sort of formalized ourselves at that point

when we were truly doing our own work. Yeah.

Very cool, very cool. Speaking of Shirley Walker,

anyone? So, of course, Shirley Walker was kind

of a one -woman show, so what kind of brought

you guys all together and brought you to work

with her? Well, um, she basically... I don't

know exactly how she got offered the Batman Animated

series, but I know that early on in that process,

because she was also interested in doing more

than just that one thing, she did get this idea

that she could mentor people and start bringing

them into this show. And she got the green light

from Doug Frank, who was at that point one of

the main executives at Warner Brothers in the

music department. Because of his blessing, she

was able to proceed with her grand experiment.

And at one point, I think there were something

like 26, 27 composers. I think maybe even more.

That she basically auditioned. So we came into

the process. It wasn't like, oh, here, nice to

meet you. Would you like to score an episode?

It was nothing like that. It was basically you

were given just something simple of hers to arrange.

Basically, we start from a sketch. So maybe she

has a sketch that she's worked out just a couple

lines that has the basic melody and the harmony

for that particular scene. And she has verbal

instructions as to which instruments she wants

those particular parts played by. And then an

orchestrator takes that sketch and makes it work

for the complete ensemble. So as an orchestrator,

that's a good way to start learning. So we would

do that first, and eventually she would give

one piece or two pieces, and we'd split an episode.

And finally, whoever would survive this process

was given an episode. And that's how the whole

thing started. She was quite an intense person.

We completely love her. We miss her terribly.

But those early days, I mean, I was scared to

death of her, frankly. It's like, you know, we

just were shaking in our boots, you know, to

go to her place and show her our music. And sometimes

she'd laugh and just say, oh, this is great.

Or sometimes she'd say, oh, Lolita. You really

need to rethink this part or something, and I

would be devastated. But hey, I survived all

those years, so I must have done something right.

She's a marvelous, marvelous woman, she was.

Yeah, no, she would talk about intimidating.

The thing is, she could just do anything. I mean,

she would sit down and play. If we brought her

an idea, she'd ask us to do a cue or something,

or even with orchestration, she would put the

score, the sketch up on the piano, and she would

reduce it all and play it all at sight. And it

was just like, whoa. I mean, she was just such

a phenomenal talent. So I kind of felt like,

how am I ever going to measure up to this? And

I sort of always thought my next key would probably

be my last. And I guess maybe that was a good

thing, because it kind of kept us doing our very,

very best. Because there were no guarantees with

her in that process. We never felt like, oh,

you're going to be doing this now. Even when

we were assigned an episode, there was no guarantee

of, like, you're going to get another episode.

It was really just in the moment, from moment

to moment, from project to project. Sometimes

I remember very plainly when she called me. She

was going to give me an episode. And she said,

OK, you're going to do this episode. And then

she called me within two hours after she told

me that. And she said, oh, false alarm. Looks

like my schedule's opened up. I'm going to be

doing an episode after all. So it was like, oh.

It was like, I was ready. Ready? Wow, this is

great. And I called my mom and everything, and

I was just like, I've got this episode. And I

called her back. No, I'm not going to do the

episode. So it was a good entree into the whole

business. One other just interjection at this

point. The reason she also was doing this, because

she was working on big features conducting for

other composers and trying to actually get her

own feature career going as well. So we often

would not only just work on on Batman the Animated

Series or later Superman, but we would be brought

along to ... We worked for Carter Burwell through

her, through Brad Fadal, and I don't know. Did

you guys ever work for Danny when she was working

with Danny on it? Not because of her. Anyway,

but she was working with these big composers

trying to get to this next level, and we were

basically her support team. Was there ever any

recording Was it bleeped out by the network or

something we have a three -second delay. No,

no, we are not live, thank God. No, I couldn't

do that. So you guys did talk about the behind

-the -scenes stuff with Shirley, and I've got

to say, thankfully, La La Land Records likes

me enough to send me a review copy of Superman,

and I am finally so glad this set came out. I

have been waiting for this set since the first

two -disc BTIS set came out, because I'm like,

ooh, world's finest, come on. And there it is.

Yup. I am so, I am like biting my tongue waiting

for Justice League and Justice League Unlimited.

Alright Just so you know We've been wanting to

get all this music out for so many years It just

hasn't we just haven't been able to get it out

and then the lala guys came along and they were

they're kind of our heroes I mean we get contacted

by fans on a fairly regular basis and It's just

I think totally don't understand that we are

not we can't just send people this music. It's

because we will We will be sued. But can't you

send us just this one piece? I swear I won't

do anything with it. We want it all out there.

We want it all to be released. Our goal is to

have everything released. Yeah, see, that's the

funny thing because... I don't want to guilt

trip Chris over this, but I'm probably going

to with this next statement. I don't know how

much money I had to scrounge up to find those

1999 CDs for Batman Beyond. But yeah, that needs

to get a full score re -release. That really,

really does. I don't think I can continue. I'm

too guilted out. Well, it's one of those things

where the original... CD for the series was great,

but it wasn't it was just like your standard

sound and I'm not complaining about Having the

music I'm just saying that it it seemed to me

that back then it was one of those things where

hey Let's release a soundtrack for the series

and it's only this many tracks where nowadays

and I guess maybe I'm spoiled by lol and records

because they come out with these two three four

sometimes eight disc collections that have I

mean Superman the animated series I believe in

total I'm trying to think how many tracks are

on that thing in total there is 168 tracks on

all four discs iTunes dude Soon as I got the

review copy I ripped it into iTunes and uh...

i'd i'd find it really funny that the two favorite

episodes of mine from the series that are on

the soundtrack are done by michael was focused

in the brightest day well thanks that's great

uh... steven are huge batman fans uh... and world's

finest in what i love about these releases and

i've said this in my written reviews is that

it's nice Nothing against the production on the

animated series side, but it's nice to be able

to hear the music without the sound effects without

the voiceovers Because there's just there's just

sometimes in when you're watching anything where

you hear a piece of music I'm like oh, that's

cool. I want to hear more of the oh wait somebody's

talking You know it's one of those things All

right, so sometimes there's a real challenge

when the idea of an action series is a superhero

that has a lot of banter. They have a lot of

talking and a lot of music and a lot of sound

effects during the fighting. And so, yes, we're

so happy that Valorland, their whole philosophy,

because they're soundtrack fans too, is to try

and present complete scores. And so that fans

can get from beginning to end the musical statements

that we were trying to create. Oh, yeah. I mean,

a lot of the stuff on Superman the Animated Series

is really great. I will say, I think it's the

live wire section, which I think Harvey did that.

I'm trying to remember. Yeah, Harvey did a lot

of that, and I forgot. And I mean, I've seen

the Livewire episode a number of times. Harvey

Cohen did that one. And listening back to the

music, it's like, oh, wow. It went from superhero

anthems from Lolita and Michael to really, really

dark rock with Harvey because of the way Livewire's

character is. And I'm like. I never thought I

would hear that kind of music for a Superman

show and it's just absolutely awesome, it really

is. Alright, we are going to move on to scoring

the superheroes. Take it away, Steve. So how

do you guys come up with such heroic themes for

any given superhero, whether it's DC or Marvel?

with Shirley, she would actually write most of

the big themes for the animated series. But as

she started cutting us a little bit more slack

and letting us do a few things in it, it's always

about trying to figure out what's the character's

essence. Trying to find a little catchy. some

catchy tune, I think, or a sound in some cases.

Sometimes it's more of a certain vibe, you know.

I mean, Shirley had this whole thing for Brainiac

that was more based on kind of like this crazy

sound. So it's really an individual thing. I

mean, if you're talking about for a whole series,

that's a really pretty complicated thing because

it has to be something memorable. But, of course,

the charge from the executives is something,

you know, something we've never heard before,

but it has to be something we love, something

memorable. Yeah, I think, you know, there's this

superheroes. It's like, you've got to figure

out what makes the hero special. If you can figure

out what makes that superhero special and translate

that into music, then there's your theme. That's

my take on it. What about you Chris? I'm just

writing from my inner fanboy really. I mean,

it's just I see the hero and I'm just so excited

about what he's doing It just kind of springs

forth. There's really no way to quantify But

this is just kind of how you feel and what you

want the audience to connect with the character

in a certain way And I just I think that for

me it's personally it's just drawing and also

how I feel about the character too Batman Beyond

theme is always the one it's like now people

just like I mean, I can't say it on the air.

They just go so crazy when they hear that thing.

I'll say it for you. They go bat shit nuts for

it. I know. There you go. I'll say it. It's my

show. I'll say it. All right. So let me just,

because originally, like I said earlier in the

interview, we were originally going to talk to

Chris about the Batman Beyond stuff. So we got

to talk about that. We were all there, including

Shirley, something where we all have stuff that

we can contribute about that. Right. So, Chris,

how did you... When they came to you and said,

okay, this is Batman, but it's Batman and the

Future, and it's not Bruce Wayne, it's this other

kid, how did you approach... Because we all know

the general themes of Batman and Superman, at

least in the DC animated universe. You know,

and they're really great themes, but with Terry

it had to be something completely different,

and with Batman Beyond, it was totally different

because it wasn't your standard orchestral music,

for the most part. I mean, yeah, it's still in

there a little bit, but most of it is harder

rock music, isn't it? Oh, absolutely, and the

first thing I need to say is, of course, they

did not come to me. They actually came to Shirley,

the producers of the show, and they said, we

love what you did on Batman and Superman. We

know you guys are the orchestra composers, and

so we wanted a different sound for Batman Beyond,

so we're not going to use you guys. And Shirley

said, I beg to differ, we absolutely can do what

you want. Why don't you give us a shot at it?

And so they said, well, we like Nine Inch Nails.

We like Trent Reznor, which is Nine Inch Nails,

and Rob Zombie. And we think that this kind of

edgy Metal slash techno approach would fit really

well with our gritty futuristic sound. And Shirley

said, well, we're going to go and prove to you

we can do this. So we all sat down. She brought

us in and said, we need to come up with a demo

that showcases this sound. And so we all set

out to produce demos of music using those general

terms, those artists as inspiration. And then

we put together a cassette tape, remember those?

And we sent it over and I think the producers

just were absolutely floored and they said they

knew that we could do it, we nailed it, and that's

how we went on to do the series. And the Batman

Beyond theme actually was one of the demos that

we used to submit for this project. And it just

happened to be something that they had gravitated

towards, that they decided they wanted to use

as the main theme. But the sound was definitely

something that we all shaped together. Now, when

you guys, because Chris, was it all you on the

individual episodes for Batman Beyond? It was

not. It was all of us. OK. Lee, Mike, Chloe.

Actually, we didn't work on that series with

Chris. So it was just the three of us and Shirley.

OK. Because I'm wondering sometimes, did they

give you guys notes? Because there are certain

scenes in certain episodes where I'm like, hey,

that's kind of like the old series. Specifically,

at the end of Rebirth Part II, welcome to my

world. Just the theme after Bruce says that line.

I was like, hey, that kind of sounds like the

old theme. Did they do that on purpose? and Bruce

Wayne would have some sort of moment, would often

go into, definitely would go into more of an

homage to the classic sound. But I mean, Terry

and all the youthful stuff was generally the

more. And it was, I mean, we produced this, it

wasn't, I mean, there were tracks and tracks

and tracks of guitar. I mean, we had. We were

producing this like we would produce a record.

I mean we literally it was you know several layers

of mixing and Overdub some mixing then mixing

then walls of guitar amps. Yeah. Yeah I mean

it was it was really it was awesome and and just

you know it just I just especially just the idea

that that Shirley fought for us and we were able

to maintain this. Shirley and I certainly didn't

look the part of rockers. Maybe Chris was a little

closer because his hair was long at that point.

Yeah, I'm a little more close. Chris is the rocker.

They could have so easily discounted us. I'm

one of those types of fans that Not just with

the DC stuff or the animated stuff, but even

with film scores I just noticed a lot of that

kind of stuff and with Batman Beyond I noticed

it a lot more because of the continuity that

the show has and You know even getting to you

know surely getting to do stuff with Batman the

animated series and I believe there was a jingle

bells tune in there somewhere. There was one

of the Joker episodes there was a There was a

holiday tune and stuff. Alright, so, Steve had

asked you guys about the heroic themes. On the

flip side, what makes an awesome villain theme?

How do you guys go about crafting one of those,

like for Darkseid or for Joker or Clayface or

any of those characters? Actually, all three

of those were from the original. Well, okay,

all three of those themes were written by Shirley.

She wrote the Dark Side theme, she wrote... Oh,

that's right, she did. I'm sorry. No, don't be

sorry. I mean, that's... And we kept using them

because the fans wanted it and it's the right

thing to do with that approach. I mean, it was

definitely a theme -based approach where it would

help the audience know. All right. I'm trying

to think, actually, but I mean, we could talk

about some of the villain themes that we've created.

We created themes for the big man in Spider -Man.

We created a theme for the light in Young Justice.

I think in The Spectacular Spider -Man, we created

a theme for the big man. And I don't think there's

any way to talk any lower than the big man. I

can talk lower than that. Michael can. But I

just know that he was... He was evil, but he

was very cool. He was very cool about his evilness.

I think the music had that sense of a groove

and an insistence, kind of an unstoppable force,

and it had a lot of the bass guitar, a lot of

low frequencies and that kind of thing to kind

of play even lower than his voice and provide

that nice evil... support the foundation for

them. Yeah, we do that now on Avengers Assemble.

We have themes for all the characters, and we

share the themes with one another so that if

I'm working on a scene that has Thor, I'll take

Mike's Thor theme and use it. And they'll use

my themes for whatever piece that they're working

on. Yes, Lolita did Hulk. Sometimes our themes

aren't even as much a tune that you can hum,

but just a sound or a feeling. On Justice, the

light was one of the big bad for that whole series,

and our theme for them was actually just a specific

type of ringing sound. It was kind of what we

would call an atmosphere. And every time that

the light is prevalent, we would work that sound

in somewhere for the score. So even if you're

not coming away humming the theme, you get the

sense that the light is there. You feel the presence.

I think what was really cool about having Shirley

do all the themes early on for Batman the Animated

Series, I just remember when I would get these

faxes from her, because she always would fax

over her themes to each of us. And I would play

this theme, and I would just think, what? What?

Like, you know, I'd get her joker theme and,

you know, it's like... I'm just like, what? What

are you doing with that, you know? But it was

cool because... I think I sort of was coming

from a place where everything was sort of more

standardized in my little neat world of everything

working like it's supposed to work. And she kind

of turned it on its head for me as a composer.

And I know that Chris and Lily to continue to

do that, I continue to be inspired by their approach

to these different things. And I think we all

have started to feed off of each other and the

way that we create these themes and what we define

as a theme and how we come to the theme. We also

write a lot of themes together, especially if

it's a show theme for the whole series. We'll

do that composition together. We bring our ideas

into one room, share them with each other, woodshed

and really craft something together that really

represents all three of us. So yeah, I think

nowadays, especially in film music, the idea

of a theme is kind of wide open. It can be really

kind of almost anything can be a theme. Hey,

speaking of themes, you'll be able to hear both

the Justice League and the Justice League Unlimited

theme along with a bunch of music from the Justice

League at a concert in Austin, Texas, played

by the Cinematic Symphony of Austin. a big group

on March 15th. So if you have any listeners out

there that are in Austin, Texas and want to hear

a big concert, it's going to be a concert of

a bunch of superhero music, but there's going

to be a brand new suite of our music from those

two series. Oh, that's very cool. Yeah, that

was one thing I really noticed was how, like

Mike was saying about you guys coming together

and doing the Young Justice theme. With that

release from La La Land, I listened to that,

and I listened to it over and over again, and

I can tell. Chris, you have dynamic duo Ice Freeze,

Lolita, you have Star City, and Michael, you

had Central City slash Washington, D .C. Those

first three tracks after the theme. I was like,

wow, it's like three completely different people,

yet they can come together on something like

the main theme, and it's like, oh, wow. It's

just simply amazing. I absolutely love a lot

of the Young Justice stuff as well, even though

the funny thing is I haven't seen all of the

series. No, no. You're not alone. It's available.

You can catch up on it. And the thing is that

have to give props to Brandon Vietti, one of

the producers, and also Greg Weissman, who wrote

a lot of the episodes. But Brandon had a very

keen idea of the fact that he wanted the show

to have kind of more of a sound design -y, kind

of a mood thing. Not, you can't say it was the

same as Batman Beyond, because Batman Beyond

was more rock and... It definitely had a little

bit more twists and turns, but Young Justice

has a certain mood. It definitely does not sound

anything like a cartoon, so it's just smooth.

I tell people if they're listening to that CD

to be careful if they're listening to the car

because they'll start driving too fast or something

will happen. At the stoplight, they'll look at

the people next to them in the car and think

they're evil or something. Anyway. it's a very

weird, it's a kind of spooky thing. It's sort

of an experience, that soundtrack. Yeah, it was

really, and it's funny because probably, hopefully

by the time this interview gets put up I'll have

my new headphones and I'm planning on listening

to a lot of this stuff on headphones and I'm

probably going to get my world just shattered

with hearing it on headphones. I'll tell you

what. playing it in your car as loud as it goes

that's that's so earth -shatteringly great to

listen to i can just see steve is steve is a

super fan of the joker and i can just see him

blaring the shirley's joker theme yes all right

i'm i'm guilty of that in a little bit of the

beyond stuff well beyond is great to blast in

a car that's for sure Yeah, that causes me to

go a little fast. It means so much to us that

people actually listen and pay attention to this

music because we spend so much time by ourselves

in our little rooms, well, our big rooms writing

our music. But it's kind of lonely and you don't

even know that people are really listening. Once

in a while we'll meet some fans either at Comic

-Con or at some of these seminars that we do.

It's just, it blows us away. I mean, sometimes

people will ask us about certain intricacies

of our scores, and it's like, I have no recollection,

but I'll just pretend that I remember everything.

It's like, always inner themes, wow. You know,

I mean, we do it because we love it, and we have

such a personal connection to the characters

and to the shows, but it's so gratifying to talk

to you guys and to meet other people. that also

love it as much as we love it. So, I mean, I'm

talking about just the whole superhero. Oh, yeah.

It's a thing. You're either into it or you're

not so into it. And we have to be into it to

be invested and to write the music that we write

and to connect with other people that are just

as invested is great. I mean, I met a couple

at Comic Con that had gotten married to some

music that I did for Star Cross, one of the Justice

League episodes, and they had actually Use the

recording from On Air for their going down the

aisle to get married. It's just unbelievable

to me. Did they tell you which track it was?

Because I bet I can guess. Well, can you guess?

I don't know. It was probably the Jon Stewart,

Shaira Hall theme at the end of part three. When

She Flies Away. When She Flies Away. Yep. Yeah,

so that's what they got married to and moved

away. Hopefully not. But hopefully, yeah, hopefully

the bride didn't fly away. Although they both

were so skinny, they were that super rock and

roll skinny that, you know, where the legs are

just like so, so skinny. I wanted to feed them

something. They were terrific. Kind of like the

Bruce Tim legs on the superheroes. Right, right.

They were terrific. That's just a great example

of who just means so much to us because they

really are listening to what we're doing and

It's like we really we write for you guys. You

really do Okay, so out of all the DC heroes and

villains, what is your favorite to score for?

Yeah, we put you on the spot Whichever one we're

supposed to be writing for this week. Yeah, that's

the cheap way out. Come on. I generally say I

gravitate more towards Batman and Superman. And

that's just because usually that's the question.

I'm kind of more dark and complicated, I think,

in my musical approach with that stuff. But I

don't know why. I mean, it's just really whatever.

Whatever the traffic will bear. I'm carrying

the torch for Superman because he gets slammed

so much for being a wuss or whatever. I mean,

I just can't believe, you know, these people

that are just like, oh, he just isn't as cool

as Batman. I think Superman is very cool, and

I like writing for Superman. I like writing for

Batman, too. Don't get me wrong. But somebody's

got to stick up for Superman, and I'll be the

guy. There you go. But as far as it went back

to Justice League, I actually had a really good

time working on the episodes with Wonder Woman.

Paradise Lost was one of my favorite episodes

to work on, and I got to use for a theme quite

a bit. Very cool, very cool. It's funny that

you say that you like the darker themes, Lolita,

since you worked on Monkey Fun. Well... That's

a very bright episode. But there are so many

episodes. There's a lot more involved. Oh, yeah.

Mine had a contrast. So Lala basically picked

which ones they wanted. And truthfully, that

music now can actually be heard, because in that

particular episode with the gorilla, with Titano,

when he gets to be this huge size, the film was

varied. So I listened to these tracks, and I

could could not, for the life of me, remember

that I'd written so many notes. So, you know,

it's definitely, yeah, kind of a fun kind of

thing. Although, you know, on the CD, Little

Girl Lost, parts one and two, those were my,

that was my first Emmy nomination. And so when

I was nominated for Little Girl Lost, that was

a huge, huge deal for me. And I worked really,

really hard on that arc. It was just, I still,

I mean, that to me is something I'm still very,

very proud of. And no, that's not dark. That's

quiet and, you know, they're dark moments, but.

Yeah. There are a few dark moments. I love that.

I think it was one of Shirley's though. I'm trying

to see here. Yeah. It was one of Shirley's from

legacy when Supergirl chases the robot. I love

that theme. so let's see here uh... uh... what

uh... let me see uh... so recently actually by

the time this goes up it'll be probably about

three days since this happened recently on february

eight twenty fourteen you guys had a signing

at creature features out there in california

how did that go and what is each of your roles

opinions on conventions, signings, interacting

with the fans. I know, Lolita, you mentioned

that a little bit earlier, but can you guys expand

on that a little bit? Well, I think Lolita really

hit the nail on the head. Our primarily interaction

is with the producers and the creators of the

show. And, you know, our primary job is to make

sure that they're happy. along the way, we're

creating this art that goes out and touches people

all over the world. And whenever we have a chance

to kind of expand that circle of who we interact

with, it's very, very gratifying for us. We had

the best time at Creature Features. It was very

well attended, but there was enough time that

we could really talk to people and get to know

what made them happy about the series. Our biggest

moment when we realized just how far the reach

of these shows have are was when we did a panel

at Comic -Con one year. It was the same year

that Teen Titans Trouble in Tokyo came out. Teen

Titans is not in continuity. Oh, thrilling, isn't

it? The suspense is killing me. This part has

been destroyed by evil call recorders. Yeah.

Your thoughts, sir? About the calling destroyed

It was dark side or the Joker one of those Alright

people, so we had to do some creative editing

around the end of the interview Because at the

beginning of the interview when I started to

use my call recorder it shat the bed And then

Steve used his call recorder and it worked for

an hour and one minute four minutes shy of the

actual discussion we had with Ms. Ritmanis, Mr.

McQuistion, and Mr. Carter. So we are so, so

sorry. Basically what you missed was part of

a question I asked them about conventions and

fan uh... meetings and stuff like that and their

contact information uh... but still uh... after

going back and looking at the file were like

oh no yeah unfortunately it was still very very

awesome talking with with three of them it was

a lot of fun uh... lot of cool questions were

answered A lot of interesting answers. There

was one point in the beginning where I'm like,

okay, Mike and Lolita, stop cheating off of each

other's papers, because I swear as soon as she

said her bio and then Mike said his bio about

they both have sisters that are into the music

and I'm like, are they looking off each other's

papers? Is this high school or something? But

yeah, very, very, very cool. Again, so sorry

the end of it got cut off. Sometimes I really

hate technology. But again, thank you so much

to Michael, Christopher, and Lolita for taking

the time. The main body of the interview is there.

Again, so awesome. Unleash the geek in you and

we will see you next time. Ooh, technical difficulties.

Let's move on, shall we?