James Hannay
I have recently finished a long project which involved me scoring a number of adverts to Jeweller to the stars Pragnell. 18 in total!
It has been super fun. I really got back in touch with my different musical influences as each ad needed its own stamp of individuality. So genre-wise Hip-hop, Pop, Balearic, Classical, Latin, House – all got a look in.
Here is a link to the Vimeo Playlist – Pragnell Ad Playlist
Well it’s a bit of a lie – as I still don’t quite know when this film is coming out but I’m promised it’s very soon. There have been a few legal issues since its premiere at the BFI London Film Festival this time last year which was a lovely evening. It has been sold to Paramount Plus so am told that its release will be imminent (and international!). Am very much looking forward to seeing it on the small screen – and will keep everyone posted as to when that happens.
I am pleased to say that i have been working with my old friend and collaborator Sarathy Korwar on a new feature doc about Indian Bodybuilders called `Tight. It has been commissioned by Vice Media and is a heart-warmer of a tale with an unlikely subject matter. I have been bought in to help Sarathy do some additional music arranging and mixing.
In the meantime of course Sarathy continues to smash it out of the park with his original music. His new album getting a 5 start review from the Guardian on Friday!
I have just completed a course with Berklee online called the Art of Mixing. Knowing that as a composer these days the finished product needs to be not just composed beautifully but also mixed like a pro, I thought I’d invest in that side of my art-form. 3 months later with Pandora’s box fully opened, and my bank balance depleted I now find myself with a load of uber-high end audio equipment. A full suite of UAD plug-ins and a Apollo Quad core interface that should serve me (and you!) very well for the next few years.
Already the difference to the sonic finish of my recent work is unquestionable and am exciting to make more sweet sounding music with this gear
Looking back over these blog posts, I can see that i have an updating cycle of approximately once a year. Safe to say I am not a natural blogger. However I have had my hands full, not least with a small boy called Henry Hannay who has been a rather large feature of my life since March 2021.
Notwithstanding I have still been working away on the music and will do a few separate posts for the differing elements that are worth putting out there
I began an exciting collaboration with an amazing luxury brand in the first Lockdown whilst the film industry was on shutdown. Pragnell Jewellery.
www.pragnell.co.uk
Its one of the rare products that it is a pleasure to score for. And these are beautiful gems. I did a series of 5 ads/promos in 2020 and then I have another series of 16 coming up. See some of the edited vids below…
Again I will post more in the videos page when it is all done.
In the height of lockdown – January 2021- I did a couple of short films for a great young Canadian director called Jacqui Drager who is definitely going places! There are a couple of comic shorts called Irish and Ash.
I worked with Antonia Pagulatos for both films as i needed an expert fiddle player that could really capture the Irish vibes needed for both films. It was my first experience working remotely with a session player and if it hadn’t been anyone else but Antonia who knows what the results would have been. But you don’t become Damon Albarn’s go-to violin (and viola) player for the last 16 years (in ALL his many many projects) without being able to deliver. So I was delighted with the results. In fact in Ash she went way beyond the call of duty and I offered her a co-composer credit. She was that good!
Here are some of the musical moments in the films
For the past 4/5 months I have been worked hard on my first feature film: Burn It Down!
Perhaps I should qualify it as a feature length documentary, but one that had its premiere at the Prince Charles Theatre in Leicester square on the opening night of the BFI London Film Festival. Which was last Wednesday – Oct 6 2021…
It’s produced by Dorothy Street Pictures and is about the somewhat disastrous reboot of the Woodstock festival which took place 30 years on from the original in 1999. I worked closely with director Tim Travers-Hawkins and editor Mike Rolt, creating a score based around the musicality of the times. Lots of guitars then, but also a fair amount of tweaked and twisted electronic as well as poignant pianos and strings.
I also, managed to get permission from the Pixies to cover one of the most iconic tracks – Where is My Mind and it was great to get some of my favourite session players in to help me do it justice. We went as far from the original as possible with a piano and strings version. You don’t want to get on the wrong side of Frank Black after all.
It was a really fun few months and am really happy with the result. It was also a thrill to see it play out in 5.1 on a big screen in Leicester Square!
The film is not yet out on general release but when it is I shall post details and of course some of my work.
In the meantime here is a link to the pre-view of the film
http://whatson.bfi.org.uk/LFF/Online/default.asp?doWork::WScontent::loadArticle=Load&BOparam::WScontent::loadArticle::article_id=61607DAA-EB27-46F6-A256-4C7D36DDB520&BOparam::WScontent::loadArticle::context_id=B3E91B5D-7B9B-4FE2-8002-5B2B687EA434
I have been pleased to be sending in regular work into a great Lift Music Library who are based down in Brighton. They have published a load of my world music pieces which is really cool.
They have also been taking some of my orchestral and guitar pieces and I hope to continue our partnership. You can find my stuff with this link:
http://search.liftmusic.co.uk/#/search/track/relevance/min-max/min-max/main/k_james/k_hannay/
