NEWBIE Here! Thoughts on developmental ARC

[hinzer91]

Hey friends, just joined TAXI this month after a decade of procrastination

I have submitted cues to a couple of listings and was fortunate enough to land a forward...however...
I consistently received the feedback on the non-forwards "Could have a better developmental "arc"" and even a couple of "Too repetitive".

In an effort to grow from the constructive criticism, I thought I would reach out to you all.

I come from a rock background and suffer from 2xVerse-2xChorus-Bridge-Chorus-itis

Any suggestions on how to best structure cues?

Should I be following a structure like...A section>>B section>>C Section to avoid repeats?

Thanks in advance.

[hinzer91]

Great thanks Tom!

Sincerely,
Danny

[todddunnigan]

One of the best pieces of advice I ever got regarding instrumentals was to put the very best part of your instrumental right at the top. This is in line with how music supervisors sift through music when they're looking for it. There's no time for an intro or a buildup, they're clicking on stuff rapid fire so you gotta hit with the best part right away. This came from Matt Vanderbough who is a Taxi rock star, plus my forwards increased when I started doing that.

[todddunnigan]

Another mistake I made concerning instrumentals was I would look at a listing and see that I have a vocal song that fits the listing, I just need to run an instrumental of it. So I would run the instrumental without the vocal and submit it. Unfortunately, without the vocal there were long stretches of the instrumental where the song was just kind of looping. You need some sort of element the replace the vocal, it doesn't have to be a melodic element, it can be just a cool sound, something to add interest and to provide "hit points" for the editor. It's best if it's not too busy or up in the high end because most likely your instro will end up with some kind of voice over so you don't want to compete sonically. Also, for your vocal replacement, keep changing it up, the editor can copy and paste your verse as easily as you can so don't give them the same part twice. Those things helped me get more forwards too.

[hinzer91]

Todd,

Thanks for the invaluable advice friend.

Danny

[Kolstad]

You can get a lot of mileage out of studying the sonata form in classical music. Especially the Sonata Allegro. Pretty much the abc of musical form used in film and tv. It is simplified for todays cues and instros, but no matter musical style, we all still draw on the explorations in form and harmony from 18th century classical music.

But overall, you can find ideas to cover both ABA and three act structure.

Wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonata_form

Article https://fxnewslive.com/what-is-sonata-f ... tructure/

Vid https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEjUFrdixuE

[hinzer91]

Thanks! This is a useful resource, very much appreciated