Link to You Tube
In November 2006, after having just moved to LA, I set myself a little challenge in an effort to hone my abilities to create large volumes of music in a short time frame. As I though about a project that I could invent to challenge my skills, I had the thought of creating a short firm for myself to score in two weeks. I had always loved the epic poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge for its epic scale, supernatural elements, and deep melancholy. After first reading the poem, I became acquainted with a riveting series of engravings by the 19th c. aritst Gustave Dore. His engravings really capture both the epic, supernatural elements, as well as the more intimate human moments embodied in the work. So, with my handy-dandy Dover edition of the poem with the engravings in hand, I set about scanning the images and began to record a reading of the work. Unfortunately, not being gifted vocally, the audio of the text was weak. However, I was able to take the audio of the reading, and merge it with a Ken Burns effect approach to the engravings, and create a short film that needed an infusion of depth to bring it to life. Thus was the clock ticking on my effort. I sat down with my composition software, and in 10 days, I had created the initial score of this work. It was scored for full orchestra and ran 30+ minutes. In a sense, it was woven from a single thread of inspiration. I got the sampled instrument library audio laid down, and proceeded to merge it all together into a film. 
That ended the project for a few years until last summer, as I contemplated the program for the Orchestra Unleashed concert in Sept., I thought about the work again and determined that it could be performed live with static slides of the images, an expert narrator, and the power of a live orchestra, and so it was. TOU performed the work in our Sept. 2010 concert accopmanied by the amazing gifts of professional actor Bryce Lenon. The audience seemed to be really moved by the combination of passionate acting and powerful orchestral texture. We recorded the work, but unfortunately, technical difficulties made the recording less than we had hoped, so I shelved the recording and the project for a while. Then, last month, I went back to the recording and worked a little magic to try to eliminate some of the noise artifacts that were so distracting in the initial recording. A nudge here, and tweak there, and viola! I was able to get rid of many of the pops and noises in the original recording. However, the narration is a bit less prominent that I would have hoped, but I was able to get a less distracting rendition put together.
That brings us to this post. With the updated soundtrack of the live performance in hand, I revisited the original video that I created from the engravings. They were a bit static before, so I spent some time updating the editing to make the visuals more engaging. I have now posted the updated video on YouTube in seven parts corresponding to the seven sections of the the original poem. It is a total of 40 minutes…but you can watch it in parts if you don’t have enough time to see the whole thing at once. Anyway, I realized that through no particular foresight on my part, this is nearly the 5th anniversary edition of the original work. Funny how life works out sometimes!
