Rocketman to Godzilla: Alumni Create Music for Summer Films

On top of all the standard artistic considerations to scoring major feature films, composing for a film like the Elton John biopic Rocketman poses its own challenge: writing music to support a movie built on iconic music.

Composer Matthew Margeson B.M. 02, who cut his scoring teeth on films such as Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children and Kick-Ass 2, had every bit of preparation he needed for the gig, from his dual major studies in composition and film scoring at Berklee to training and working with scoring titans Hans Zimmer and Henry Jackman.

In a recent interview in Score It Magazine, Margeson recounts how he found his approach, asking, Why are we trying to reinvent Elton John, musically? We have all of these amazing musical threads...so why don't we attempt to use those as part of the fabric of the score? To make that happen, Margeson worked closely with the films music producer, Giles Martin (son of George Martin, legendary producer for the Beatles). Giles and I had to combine forces...and figure out creatively how to make the score seamlessly fade away within a song... It was a clever collaborative process between Giles and his team.

Find Out What It Takes to Score a Film

Learn the art, craft, and tools of scoring for a variety of media, with Berklees Film Scoring Department. In addition to Rocketman, other summer films that feature music Berklee alumni helped create include:

Godzilla: King of the Monsters (Warner Bros.): Jason Akers B.M. 11, scoring assistant; Angelina Park B.M. 15, assistant to the composer; Kaiyun Wong B.M. 14, scoring coordinator

Shaft (Warner Bros.): Bobby Villarreal B.M. 13, MIDI programmer

Marooned (Dreamworks): Amie Doherty M.M. 13, composer

Childs Play (Orion): Jason Akers and Etienne Monsaingeon 17, scoring assistants

Dark Phoenix (20th Century Fox): Alejandro Moros 17, technical assistant

Astronaut (Buck Productions): Virginia Kilbertus M.M. 16, composer

Seize & Secure: The Battle for La Fi re (PBS feature documentary): Lauren Butcher, composer

Watch the trailer for Rocketman:

Video of Rocketman (2019) - Official Trailer - Paramount Pictures

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