Film trailer music

In today's lesson, I looked at some different styles of music and how they would suit different genres, how a piece of music fits a genre depends on a number of factors, we were set a task in which we had to guess which music track fitted with which genre. We had to listen for certain key parts of the music that help to convey the genre such as; is it major or minor, instruments, pace, sound effects and the connotations of what we hear, this will be useful when choosing the right music to fit my genre because it will help me to be able to recognise the typical soundtracks that should and shouldn't be used in a trailer to help suit the themes, conventions and genre.



Music is vital for the film being able to convey its genre because if a film trailer has the wrong type of music, it's going to connote the wrong type of genre unless it is being used contrapuntally, so it is important that the film trailer uses music that fits in with the conventions of their film, for example an uplifting film is likely to have major melodies and sound generally happy whereas a sad perhaps mournful film is likely to contain minor chords in the music, because the different styles of music create different kinds of moods for example horror trailers are likely to use 'eeri' and 'creepy' music using screaching violins or synthesized keyboard chords to create a sense of dramatic tension and make the audience feel this tension through the fear provoking soundtracks alongside what is happening on film.

I've looked at An article by the guardian that outlines some details about film trailer music, the article explains how trailer music is there to complement what we see on the the screen and to help emphasise the mood and themes however it is not always composed espec=
Horror films

                  
This horror trailer is interesting because it begins with some contrapuntal music that implies that all is well and there is nothing about to go wrong, it's all fairly happy and upbeat in the style of a home movie, this establishes a juxed opposition atmosphere where there is an equilibrium through the use of a typical pop song, but then at around 40seconds in to the trailer the music changes to the typical horror style of music. So the change in music establishes a disequilibrium and that something bad is about to happen.
The instruments used in this trailer create a very intense and spine-chilling atmosphere; the use of synthesized chords on a keyboard to build up the tension is very eeri and emphasises the level of suspense greatly, there are also two keys on the keyboard being played as the suspense begins to build which evokes tension and hostility. The use of screeching string instruments become louder and louder when there is a piece of enigmatic action, (1minute and 37seconds in) everytime there is a piece of jump-action the echoing string instruments explode in to a half second long burst of eeri music, which adds a large amount of drama to what we see on screen. This film trailer follows the typical musical conventions of a horror film which enables it to effectively portray its genre to its audience. I think the most effective aspect of the choice of music is the way that there is no consistency in the music; there is a lot of stopping and starting and a varied range of sounds, there is a sound of something that sounds like air being sucked through a straw, violins and synthesized keyboards, this creates a large sense of suspense and I find that it puts the audience on edge because it inflicts fear in to the audience in the way it has numerous explosions of eeri sounds and also the way in which instruments are used to build up the suspense that leads to the musical jump scare.

Film realism/Realistic drama


The music in this film trailer follows what we see on screen, the music isn't the most important factor for a film however with this genre because it is mainly about the dialogue so the audience can gain an understanding of the storyline, but it does follow the mood of what is happening on the screen, during the beginning where the mood is a lot more upbeat because he's making friends the music is also a lot more upbeat and then when the mood changes to more angry we hear a punk track which is connotational to the skinhead culture in the time which this film is set, then towards the end there is a more downbeat acoustic track which impacts the mood greatly and makes the audience realise that a problem has occurred, it contrasts the music that was being played over before and emphasises the dark side of skinhead culture by going from this angry punk rock track to a mellow, mournful acoustic track that connotes sadness, so there are three tracks in this trailer which all create a different mood;first upbeat and happy, then angry punk rock, then a downbeat mellow acoustic track, there are no fancy special effect sounds that we would expect to see in a horror, just tracks played over what we see on screen that very simply reflects the mood on screen effectively and powerfully. Since this is my chosen genre I am going to look in to more detail about these film trailers and their choice of music and take inspiration from them.

Choice of music