JAMES HANNIGAN – HARRY POTTER’S OTHER COMPOSER
Interview by Joseph W. Bat
Hi James, thanks for doing this interview. You are no stranger to writing music for games, but for those who might not know, can you tell us a bit about yourself and how you got into writing music and specifically for video games.
I started out intending to write mostly for TV and Films but found myself working on games around 1993, initially by chance. Being one of the first generation of adults who had grown up with games all around them, it felt quite natural getting involved in them.
Just as it is now, it was a very competitive, but in a different way. There were fewer composers, but fewer projects, and the work could be quite specialized. The culture was different from today's and there was less in the way of shared production methods and values between industries. Digital Audio changed all that. I'd just missed the end of a very 'techie' (but impressive) era of games music that had required special technical knowledge to get music (and I mean any music) out of computers and consoles, and I can't say I was unhappy about that.
After working freelance for a while (contributing to games such as Warhammer for the newly released Playstation) I joined Electronic Arts in 1995 as in-house composer. When I started there the audio team consisted of only a few people and, pleasingly, some of the them are there today and we are still good friends. At EA, I got to work on many projects, ranging from Privateer: The Darkening (under the Origin label, which was one of the first games with live action, featuring Clive Owen and John Hurt), several EA Sports titles and others. But being in-house wasn't working for me and I left two years later, going freelance again and basing myself at Pinewood Studios.
After leaving EA UK I kept my relationship with the company and I've worked with them on and off over the last decade. I also sparked off working relationships with Elixir Studios and Digital Anvil (both now closed) and Kuju, among others. In a nutshell, I've worked on around forty titles, have had four BAFTA nominations for music and shared a win with EA for one of the Theme Park games in 2000. I've dabbled in sound design (films such as Lost In Space); composed for commercials, trailers and production libraries; written articles on games music - but I still think of myself as starting out.
Since the first Harry Potter video game, Jeremy Soule had written the music. How did you get involved with composing Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix video game score and at what point during development?
As mentioned, I had a relationship with EA in the UK going back over a decade so I was no stranger to the team. I had pitched for the first Harry Potter game around 2000 but lost out to Jeremy who, at the time, was one of the few composers in the industry with an orchestral show reel - and a very good one at that. In the years following, I became increasingly involved in projects requiring orchestral scores (such as Evil Genius, Republic: The Revolution, Catwoman and others) and such experience is always helpful.
I started working on Order of the Phoenix semi-intensively last summer before hitting a crunch-time around January 2007.
How long did you have to write the score and how much music was written?
Condensing everything into 'man months', I would say it took about six to score the game and there was about seventy minutes of music in all. Fifty-five of those were orchestral.
How did you approach writing music for the game?
I tried to be objective, allowing myself to be led by the game, its story and visuals. Stylistically, it could be said that there is a kind of a 'Harry Potter' sound – one that taps into a broader language of fantastic, magical music you might encounter within the classical repertoire or in films of a similar genre. But there is room for maneuver within this framework, and you hope you can put your own stamp on things.
Putting style aside for a moment, games often differ from films in terms of the way music functions within them. The player has to be treated as 'belonging' to the game as well as being audience to it. A film has to pack a lot of story into a few hours, whereas a game hands control of time (and sometimes story) over to players themselves. A game like OOTP gives players a chance to simply exist at and explore Hogwarts, so music has to support this side of the experience as well as 'impose' a story on them. Games can be a bit of an open book in many ways and music needs to reflect this by being flexible enough to adapt.
The music in the Harry Potter video games has earned much praise, but has been missing John Williams’ well known theme for Hedwig. Why did it take so long and how did it come about to use it in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix?
I can't comment on why it wasn't used until this point, and I wouldn't go so far as to say the earlier scores suffered without it. It's also possible that, at the time of the first game, Hedwig's Theme may not have acquired such iconic status. Once EA had a hit without the theme, it may have been natural to continue on that course for a while. In the case of OOTP though, an extra-special effort was being made to match the game's look and feel with the film series, and this led to Hedwig's Theme making an entry.
John Williams, Patrick Doyle, and now Nicholas Hooper have written music for the Harry Potter films - each having somewhat different musical approaches. Were there any special musical requests made to make it sound like one of the past films? And how conscious were you of the upcoming Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix film?
There was some mention of John Williams (as there generally is!) and the occasional mention of Patrick Doyle but, on the whole, nothing was set in stone and the game itself was allowed to motivate the music. With regard to the film, there was very little I could take into consideration as it hadn't been scored by the time I'd finished on the game. In any case I believe the goals of the game and film are different enough to justify two scores.
What specific original themes did you write for the game?
Music mostly exists either for characters or for episodes/missions involving them, along with music for certain situations Harry finds himself in – either in a general way or relating to the story. There were themes for Fred and George, Umbridge, Filch and Cho (a love theme), among others.
Was the decision to use a full orchestra and chorus made early on or later?
Early on. It has happened for most of the games in the series and it really is quite necessary for something like this. There are some things you can't really achieve without a good orchestra, and you wouldn't want to.
You recorded with the Philharmonia Orchestra, Pinewood Singers and Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra. How was the experience and why two different orchestras?
This wasn't entirely planned. Sessions with the Philharmonia and choir at Air Lyndhurst were always going to happen to cover a certain portion of the material, but it emerged there would be the possibility of supplementing this with some further orchestral music recorded elsewhere. I've recorded the Slovak RSO a number of times before with Allan Wilson, the conductor on the project, so this was a natural choice for us.
Many video games suffer from music looping. How do you as a composer deal with this during the writing and editing process?
I tend to think that a lot of games suffer not only from looped music, but from 'baked' music in general. But short of having live control over the fundamental aspects of music in games, I struggle to see how things can really be different within the current model. The playback technology is always improving and that's a good thing, but it should never be allowed to compromise musicality. To an extent, the technology actually determines the nature of content – as your question implies – so the trick is to work with it without losing what you find interesting and engaging about music at the same time. This is something the industry is increasingly learning to achieve.
Loops, for example, are mostly used to make music more 'elastic,' enabling you to stretch it over indeterminable periods of time. But it is true that the impression can be one of music not really being scored to picture the more aware of the repetition you become. A loop can shatter the illusion that music is meant to be there at the very moment you are hearing it by drawing attention to the underlying technology. This is a bit like watching a film and becoming aware of the projector! But if you have to 'write for loops' there is definitely an art to doing it. The material shouldn't say so little as to be mindless and boring, neither should it say so much that it appears to be imposed on the game, diverging from what you are seeing or doing at the time. On the whole though, I'd like to see loops go.
Different games present different problems regarding 'interactive music,' looping and so on. Endless world games can never really get enough music, if they need any at all. But a linear game taking, say, fifteen hours to play through doesn't necessarily need to create the illusion of music going on forever. It's just a question of having enough content and distributing it thoughtfully across the experience. The OOTP game, for instance, avoids looping fairly well, I feel, and isn't afraid to use silence, either. I can see this scripting process becoming increasingly important for games composers, making the role even more specialized.
It has always been common to use temp tracks in films. As a composer of video game scores, do you encounter this as well? If yes, how do you feel about the temp track process?
From an artistic perspective, I suppose it's not ideal, as I think choosing what style to adopt and deciding when and why music gets heard are all part of the creative process. The composer needs some motivation to write the music and isn't just a machine for implementing someone else's ideas. At other times, temp tracks can help speed things along when you don't have a clue as to what style may be required. But it helps if you actually consider the temp tracks appropriate, of course!
In my own case, whenever I've been given free reign with music, the results have been better received by other people. I think this is because the work becomes more personal to you the more involved you are in the entire creative process.
What did you enjoy most about writing music for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix?
It's always fun to work with the team at EA, who are very enthusiastic and creative in their own areas and, of course, contributing something to the Harry Potter universe is undeniably exciting!
What is your favorite Harry Potter film score?
John Williams' Prisoner of Azkaban. When it comes to working with an orchestra, exploring its range and getting sheer musicality from it, there just isn't anyone else like him.
And finally, can you tell us what you are working on currently and upcoming?
I'm currently working on a title for Electronic Arts and one for Kuju (to be published by Nintendo) but the details of these are under-wraps.
Home Page | Reviews A-M | Reviews N-Z | Composers | Links
Site copyright © 1997-2007, Jonathan Broxton/Movie Music UK. This page copyright © 2007. All rights reserved. The reviews and articles contained herein may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of the author. Some artwork and multimedia material are © various record labels and artists. All photos, multimedia and album artwork used are for non-profit making, promotional purposes, and no copyright infringement is intended.