Meeting Chris Beck

Last Friday I got the opportunity to visit Chris Beck at his studio in Santa Monica. I was able to get in touch with him because we both received the Pete Carpenter Fellowship (though he got his a 'few' years before me). When I arrived I was greeted by his assistant accompanied by a lot of scary screaming coming from the back of the studio. I was given a tour of the place which was fantastic. In his studio is a live recording room, the server room and a full mixing suite. The server room contains all the sounds, along with 10 mac pros and maybe 8 to 10 mac minis networked together. Then I was brought to the screaming where I met Chris and his other assistant Leo engaged in a very serious game of foosball. I was introduced to Chris and we headed outside to talk. He wanted to hear a lot about my story and how I got here. I'll spare that part, as my whole story is written here in the blog. We also talked a lot about the composers we know. Chris has worked with many of the composers I have met so his insight into the world was very helpful.

Then it came down to business. In terms of what Chris needs, he said that he is actually overstaffed, but having us both be Pete Carpenters, he wanted to help me out. One thing he said would benefit me was to advertise at UCLA and USC and offer to write scores for student films. He said this won't pay the bills, but it will keep me writing, give me exposure, experience and if any of the student directors or producers gets a job in the industry, I'll already have a working relationship with them, so getting a scoring job is a possibility. Chris was in the process of contacting someone he went to school with many years ago who is doing a major film he wants to write for so he said it does pay off. It took Chris almost 10 years to really make it in the business, so I know I have my work cut out for me.

After that he recommended that I get in touch with Trevor Morris. Trevor does the music for The Borgias, and The Tudors and had just finished his first A list feature, Immortals. I did send him an email and he responded to me the next day. He said that I am a bit on the inexperienced side having not worked for another composer yet, but he said we should meet anyway. I'm hoping to set up a meeting soon and see what we can work out.

All in all it was an amazing day with Chris and I feel like I'm in the right place doing the right thing and just need to put in my dues and get ready for the long haul. More to come soon!