The Presence (Conrad Pope)When MovieScore Media released Conrad Pope’s score for In My Sleep last year, the album was met with great enthusiasm. Ain’t It Cool’s Scorekeeper enthusiastically claimed that ”Pope is an extremely talented composer… … (his) gifts as an orchestrator I’m sure are indispensable to the composers who hire him; however, I would really love to see him orchestrate less and compose more.” Ain’t That So! We are happy to announce our second project together with Conrad, releasing his stylish orchestral score for the independent horror feature The Presence, starring Mira Sorvino. The music is very elegant but dark, ominous but beautiful, and it’s clear that Conrad Pope has much composition in him despite the fact that he’s best known for his orchestration work on some minor movies as the Star Wars, Harry Potter andMatrix series. Our release of The Presencescore album co-incides with Lionsgate’s US DVD release of the film.

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PURCHASE THIS ALBUM!

PURCHASE CD at Screen Archives • DOWNLOAD at iTunes

A NOTE FROM THE DIRECTOR

Anyone who knows me knows I am a soundtrack fanatic. Walk into my house, ride in my car, chances are film music is what you’ll hear playing. Scoring a film is an opportunity for a composer not only to help guide the journey of an audience, but also to add additional layers to what is occurring on screen. Yet film music often seems perfunctory and superficial.

Even in the script stage, it was apparent The Presence would be a challenging movie to score. With so little dialogue present in the movie, including a first act almost entirely without words, I knew the score would be more important than usual. This was exciting… and also a bit frightening. With so much ‘open space’ for music, the movie was in many ways a blank canvas. This provided wonderful opportunities to soar but also a lot of room for failure. There was a lot that could go wrong. We needed a gifted composer who would not be afraid to take some risks. As has become obvious to anyone who was seen The Presence, we were lucky enough to have such a composer in Conrad Pope.

Often in movies the soundtrack simply mimics what is occurring on screen, adding little to the images, action and dialogue. We did not want to take that approach. I also wanted a score that would help create a world the viewer would enter when watching the movie. But while I did not want music similar to a typical ‘scary movie’ score, I never imagined music as dreamy and lush as much of the music Conrad composed. The first track he turned in, “Mr. Browman Arrives”, actually threw me at first listen because it was so different than anything I heard in my head while writing and filming the movie. Yet that track was so beautiful and haunting, with wonderful subtle undertones of darkness, I could not stop listening.

When next I heard Conrad’s theme for the ghost – the lonely, melancholy theme on bassoon first heard in the opening title – I began to fall in love with Conrad’s approach: to focus on and support the emotional underpinnings of the story, rather than the superficial ghost story elements. He also wanted to deepen the dark romantic beauty of the film created by our remarkable DP, Collin Brink, and our production design team, led by the equally gifted Darcy Scanlin.

Conrad’s score is very much in line with the twisted fairy tale aspect of the film. His music is beautifully crafted, very original and often surprising. The music not only supports and adds to the movie, but like the cabin in which the movie takes place, becomes a character all its own. It is a remarkable achievement. I can’t wait to work with him again.

Tom Provost (writer/director)

TRACK LISTING
  1. Main Title 1.47
  2. First Night 3.00
  3. The Outhouse 2.18
  4. Mr. Browman Arrives 2.35
  5. News Clipping 0.34
  6. Dawn 2.51
  7. Outhouse at Night 2.27
  8. A Proposal 3.55
  9. Whispers 1.12
  10. Estrangement 1.07
  11. Up the Stairs 4.35
  12. Trapped 1.26
  13. The Offer 1.29
  14. Alienation 1.50
  15. Epiphany 1.33
  16. Let’s Have a Little Fun 1.44
  17. Time to Act 0.58
  18. Talking to the Dead 2.13
  19. Confrontation 1.46
  20. Revelation 3.26
  21. Journey Back / End Credits 4.12

ALBUM INFO
  • Title: The Presence (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
  • Composer: Conrad Pope
  • Catalogue no: Screamworks SWR-11006
  • Release date: October 4, 2011 (CD/online)