Composer Richard Beddow and his team have been delivering some of the best scores for videogames that one could hope for. The soundtracks for Empire: Total War, and Viking: Battle for Asgard are two exceptional examples of the stellar work being produced. In this interview, Richard takes us behind the innovative process that he employs and offers some great insight about the wonderful music we're being treated to. Enjoy.
Listen to some musical selections from Empire:
ScoreNotes: I really enjoy the music you've delivered of late, both with Viking: Battle for Asgard and Empire: Total War. Can you tell us a little bit about how you and the composing teams you're involved with seem to work so well together?
Richard Beddow: I think the reason that it works so well is because we realised that when you are working with a team of composers, the main goal is to achieve consistency in style. You can imagine, unless certain measures are introduced, you could easily end up with a score that has no unity and could vary technically and artistically. In a project like Viking for example -- which has a story as its foundation --I created initial cues to set the musical vibe and tone. These were then sent to the other composers in order for them to create tracks in a like style. Additionally, I would ask them to also take key fragments of my themes to incorporate and vary in to their own tracks, thereby binding all the cues and having a common thread run through related cues. One of the things I like about working with other composers is that each brings a different musical perspective to the table, yet while I am asking them to produce in a required style, incorporating themes and such we still get individuality coming through within the cues, which helps give a nice sense of 'flavouring' to the music.
When we start out on a project we don't always know at the outset if we'll be able to record with an orchestra, and it may be such that budgets don't stretch to this or schedules might make it impractical - so we have to prepare for this scenario. This essentially means we could end up shipping the game using the MIDI versions of our scores. Firstly, this means we still have to produce high quality mockups and secondly, it brings us back to the goal of achieving consistency. Since our composers work out of their own studios with different tools and such we needed a way to narrow things down to ensure that our MIDI versions sounded as close as possible. So to do this I built up a list of libraries we'd use to create the music, then I would ensure that the composers we used had these libraries and were instructed to create their new templates to incorporate them. This resulted in MIDI cues that were consistent in sound and fully orchestrated before we go to record it live.
When it comes to the live recordings, there is one process left to ensure that the blend of composers music matches as much as possible and that is the orchestration. Once I have approved all composer cues, MIDI files were produced, edited, cleaned and sent off to Nic Raine, the orchestrator. I think that it was important in terms of achieving consistency that we used 1 sole orchestrator on the project because he would see and 'process' all the cues and could make changes to our orchestrations where needed to bring one cue for example more in line with another, helping it to sound like one voice.
ScoreNotes: In your recent score for, Empire, you had an opportunity to tackle both adventurous and dramatic subject matter set in the Revolutionary War period . What was your overall plan of attack for this project?
Richard Beddow: The game features a campaign called 'The Road To Independence' which is essentially like a sub-game within Empire - it's a mini quest. This campaign is based on the buildup of the American revolution leading to the Declaration Of Independence. Musically, this section of the game is very different from the rest of Empire because it has to support the drama of this build up via a collection of short in-game movies sequences. This was a nice section of the game to work on because it allowed us the opportunity to create themes that don't have to withstand the repetition, like say the in-game battle music, which meant we had more freedom to express ourselves. Tonally, as the subject matter involved uniting America, we wanted to have a build in the music towards the final movie, so basically early movies played down any hint of Americana where as the latter ones embraced it.
ScoreNotes: Part of what I enjoy about the work you're doing is that the music seems to transcend the game and makes for a great listening experience. Can you talk a bit about the thought that goes into making a well arranged soundtrack release?
Richard Beddow: On the soundtrack, the goal is to present the best listening experience from the game, but in doing so being sensitive to the story or concept behind the game. First and foremost the music we produce has to function well with the game visuals, but generally I want all the pieces to sound as good as possible outside of the game also so I'll strive for making the music the best it can be whether created by myself or one of the team. When we're ready to start preparing for a CD release, I generally start by evaluating all the available tracks picking out the strongest candidates, paying attention to not only the compositional strength but also the orchestrational colours and making note to put aside those cues which are significant story telling cues as these will form the backbone of the release. Next, I'll set out the backbone tracks on a timeline so I can see a start, middle and end to the CD, following on from which I will begin inserting the remaining tracks around them in an order which can support the telling of the story. Once I have completed the process as above, I'll play through the list assessing the structure and feel of the tracks to work out if any of the non backbone tracks need replacing with a better alternative, whether that's due to feel, tempo, structure or orchestration and so on, always trying to keep the listening experience as good as possible. Finally having the tracks also recorded live helps regarding the enjoyment of the listening experience; it adds depth, detail and life in to all the musical parts.
ScoreNotes: What cues do you feel stand out as the highlights from the Empire soundtrack?
Richard Beddow: If I was to compile a selection of say 5 tracks that I felt represent the game well in terms of a cinematic listening experience I would chose The Empire Theme, Uncharted Waters, The Pirates Attack, Plotting the Rebellion and The Powhaten Attack.
ScoreNotes: Moving on to another score from your team, Viking: Battle for Asgard. I found that the choral sections in it were truly captivating and entertaining!. What were some of the inspirations behind those cues and how much fun was it to write music with such an epic tone?
Richard Beddow: For a composer, Viking represented a fantastic opportunity. Not only because we're given the opportunity to record the score live with orchestra and choir but also because of the opportunities within the game which allowed for some very colourful writing. With a fantasy game which featured gods, dragons, magic, undead armies and so on, there is an awful lot of scope to dig in to this with the music. To support these elements we knew early on the music needed to sound huge to support the epic battles and such but adding choir was a way to really tap in to the fantasy element and especially enhance the battles with the hoards from the underworld. The choir gave a truly dark sense of godly power to the battle tracks and movie sequences. The visuals for this game are very good and inspiring to work with, but aside from working with the game itself I also got hold of concept art and still images from the game to help immerse myself in this world and absorb it's flavour.
ScoreNotes: Can you talk about the technology that you used in support of the orchestral elements in Viking and Empire?
Richard Beddow: Each composer has his own person setup which he is comfortable working with - though as mentioned earlier we are using the same sample libraries for consistency. In my case, my composing setup is based on an Intel Mac Pro running Digital Performer, this handles all the sequencing and mixing. This is then fed via ADAT 16 channels of audio from two PC's that are kitted out with all the sample libraries. When we come to record the score live we record on to Pro Tool HD via an assortment of high end pre-amps and converters. In the case of both scores, each cue had a click track set up to provide the conductor and musicians timing info, this is crucial because some of the tracks were to movie segments, some needed electronic samples adding at a later date and we'd need the ability to splice different 'takes' of the recordings together when we needed to, all of which would not have been easy if we'd not use the click. If we are combining electronic elements back with the orchestra we will create a 'stem' mix of those elements and bring it with us to the recording session so we can hear it with the live orchestra. If no further tweaking of it is needed it will then become part of the final mix.
ScoreNotes: In general, do you feel that fans of film scores are missing out on something great if they haven't explored the world of game music yet?
Richard Beddow: Without a doubt, yes. While I do think that Hollywood budgets still allow for producing scores which are for the most part not achievable on the majority of game audio budgets, as you're aware some of the orchestral game scores coming out now are on par with film scores technically and artistically and are very enjoyable listening experiences. Additionally, many games have such diverse levels and therefore music requirements that there is every possibility to build a good musical journey on the CD like you would with a film score and deliver an interesting and moving experience on a CD release. Furthermore, aside from the increase in live orchestral scores we are seeing now, there are also many scores which are hybrids fusing electronics and orchestra or are simply electronic driven scores like you might get on a racing game etc. There is such a wealth of interesting game music out there that I think the music fans, whether or not they are film score fans would be missing out on if they never explored this genre.
ScoreNotes: As composer who has worked on many top video game projects, how impressed are you in how quickly game music has evolved into what it is today?
Richard Beddow: Well, from a technology stand point we have had the capability for well over a decade to stream Redbook (CD quality) audio from the game discs, this was the first hurdle. The only thing to have limited the musical output during these early days was budget, sampling technology and the composing talent available. So in the early days, game soundtracks featuring orchestral music would have sounded very MIDI. What has been impressive is the sudden shift that was created by the likes of Gigastudio and Kontakt allowing composers access to heavily detailed and superbly recorded orchestral sample libraries facilitating realistic mockups and taking MIDI scores and demos up a level. No doubt this has helped in allowing developers and publishers see what a great score can sound like and surely has helped in securing budgets to record with orchestras and choirs.
