Faded Endings

[mazz]

The fact is, most film/TV music needs to have button endings. This is borne out by watching 30 minutes or less of TV and listening to how the shows get into and out of scenes, to and from commercials, etc. The ad agencies want faded endings for exactly as Dave mentioned (as has been mentioned by Taxi in the listings as well), they want the "cachet" that comes from using an indie artist's music, and most (not all) music intended for consumption by the listening public and not intended from the beginning for licensing has fades.

It is so easy to do a fade these days in a DAW or stereo audio editing program that it shouldn't be an issue to just fade something that has a button ending. If you need to repeat the chorus again while you fade, it's dead easy to repeat a chorus in your editor, just copy and paste. As long as you do it on the downbeat or in some musical way, it will sound like it was meant to be there. If you have ears, you can do this.

The thing I've learned from my own experience and the experience of others is:

The clients won't use their imagination, you have to give them what they want (or what they think they want, but that's another issue!), or better yet, give them what they ask for. The best we can do is to try to give them what they are requesting and move on until (if or when) they call. We have no control over their reaction to our music, we only have control over what we produce and submit.

Just my 2c

Mazz

[Ellwood]

"they want the "cachet" that comes from using an indie artist's music,"

Is that true Mazz? why would it be a advantage to feature a unknown artist in the credit line for a series etc.? I guess what I mean is, who would think that is cool?

[Casey H]

"they want the "cachet" that comes from using an indie artist's music,"

Is that true Mazz? why would it be a advantage to feature a unknown artist in the credit line for a series etc.? I guess what I mean is, who would think that is cool?

Music from unknown artists is used all the time for 2 main reasons:

1. Often, they like the feel of a known artist's track but the licensing fee for a well known song is prohibitive. Hence the market for "replacement traacks" - tracks that have the same vibe and feel as something folks are familiar with. Sometimes they'll "temp in" a song during editing- maybe a hit by Adele, Blink-182, etc with the intention of replacing it later with something much more affordable.

2. If they use a well known artist's hit song, it can take away from the scene. Viewers may get focused on "Hey, I love that Kelly Clarkson song!" and the music ends up detracting from the scene instead of enhancing it. Remember, the SCENE is the star and the music is just a supporting character to make it even better-- kinda like an Ed McMahon for Johnny Carson.

Casey

[ahoth]

Hello to some familiar and unfamiliar faces...been awhile.

A tip for creating fade endings: try an exponential fadeout rather than a linear one; the prominent beginning of the fade will cue the listener that the song is ending, and the more gradual end of the fade will allow the track to less abruptly reach silence.

Also, I prefer to begin fadeouts just before a repeat of whatever section is ending the song rather than just after the final repeat begins. In the latter case, the full-power hit on bar 1, beat 1 of the ending implies to the listener that a complete iteration of the final section will be heard, and then there's an emotional letdown when the fade begins shortly thereafter. In the former case, the listener is given a cue to the fadeout thanks to the less-powerful downbeat (and thanks to the start of the fade itself, especially if it's exponential in nature) so the fade isn't as "disappointing."

Of course, in a scene, on-screen events may dictate different decisions WRT the timing of fades...but we don't always know the specific context in which our music will be used so the above approach seems solid.


Andre