Using a Live Orchestra in Game Soundtracks

Budgeting

And here's the really great part. Your entire music budget, even with the composer's creative fee and orchestra, will still cost you less than any other single element in your production. This can obviously be argued, depending on how fine you break your budget down. But look at it this way: Game design, graphics, art, cinematics, story, technology, interface, level scripting, sound design, music - that's roughly 10 basic categories in a typical production. Assuming they all have equal importance in the game, you might attribute equal amounts of a $3 million project to each facet - each receiving $300,000. Of course we all know that is not how it works. I know of one game project in the history of making games with a music budget this big. Some parts of the production will have hard costs greatly exceeding others - music not being one of them. But, I dare say, you can have a full orchestra in your production for between $80 and $150,000 all in (that means all included).

But, perhaps we should look at this a little differently. Let's call the idea of recording a live orchestra for a video game the epitome; the zenith of music in games. Something that we in the industry will shoot for if we have the budget, the time and the manpower to make full use of it. But, somewhere in between the composer playing all samples and instruments by themselves and recording the full orchestra/choir grand theme and variations - lies the middle ground of where a smaller group of musicians get hired to play on the music tracks for the game. The quality skyrockets while the costs and burdens of the production process remain fairly low. This can make a very high quality music score, still achieving all of your creative objectives in the process.

So, with music having such a pivotal role in the quality of gameplay, your same $3 million project should easily afford some production dollars to the category: "Live Musicians". And, assuming the creative fee is reasonable, you can and should contractually require your composer to hire at least a few musicians for your title ensuring it doesn't go in his/her pocket. This is often a standard point in film music contracts. This serves as a major communication at the beginning of the project to your composer - "We care a lot about what you are doing!". Though that money won't be going into the composer's pocket, they will be grateful, and I guarantee they will work harder on the music. In one fell swoop, you've just guaranteed a higher level of quality for your total game.

When you lowball your composer's fee - an unfortunate fact in the game audio business at this point - you force him/her to play all instruments as well as compose the music. This is typical. I do this on certain projects. But, I can promise better results when I hire live musicians to sweeten the tracks. And I am not talking about an entire orchestra. It can range from a few soloists up to a full orchestra. On several non-orchestral tracks for Myst III: Exile, I would bring in a percussionist or a Duduk player. There's no way I can play the Duduk. People are still talking about the sound of the Duduk in that score. They loved it. It made a big difference in the quality of the score. And the added costs for this leap in quality can be as low as $1000 US for several soloists playing. Peanuts in the budget scope of most games. Here are some guidelines for dealing with various music budgets.

Low Music Budgets
Of course, some projects will barely have enough budget to pay a composer at all. So let's start with the next rung of the audio budget ladder.

Your composer may be a brilliant musician. The trouble is that even a brilliant musician can play no more than a handful of instruments brilliantly. With a few extra dollars, every musician playing on your project can be brilliant, and the quality will show.

In a low music budget project, consider allocating $1,000 to $5,000, over and above the composer's creative fee, for musicians. This will immediately give the composer another serious tool for making the music better. I would say significantly better. He/she will take this into account while composing and perhaps write for instruments not before possible, because they don't have those particular samples at their disposal or they don't play that instrument. It will immediately take away some significant creative roadblocks.

I scored a trailer for E3 where I used nothing but samples. The producers liked it, but I could tell they weren't in love with it. I brought in a french horn player to replace the french horn sample within my score and then gave it back to them. They were completely blown away. One of them even said, "Wow, was that french horn part in your last mix?"! The difference of including just a few extra players can dramatically increase the quality of the music in your game.

Medium Music Budgets
Add $5,000 to $30,000 to the music production budget. Remember, you can specify what this money is to be used for in your music agreement with your composer and hold him to it. This category varies greatly depending on the type of game produced, what kind of music is required, and size of the ensembles playing. But, for this size project, in this range, you can absolutely hire a small orchestra to record your composer's music. It's a question of how much of the music you will be recording (perhaps only the cinematics?), how large the orchestra will be, and where you will be recording. The costs, quality and level of control all seem to go up in relation to one another. But, with careful planning on the part of the composer/music producer, you can get a great bang for the buck here. More on this in the "Orchestral Recording Options" section.

High Music Budgets
Here the budgets go from $30,000 on up -- again, over and above the creative fees. This will get you everything from a full orchestra in Prague on up to the London Symphony Orchestra and a Los Angeles contract orchestra.

	Studer A827 24-track analog recorder.

Orchestral Recording Options

Today, perhaps as a result of the globalization of the world's collective economies, we have many options when recording an orchestra for film, television and in our case, game soundtracks. This is by no means a comprehensive list, but represents a solid menu of options to suit many budgets, schedules and tastes. These are listed from lowest budget to highest.

Recording in Eastern Europe
Through a service in Santa Monica, CA called Forte Music http://www.fortemusic.net , you can teleconference with various orchestral recording groups throughout Eastern Europe, including Prague and Budapest. To record a 50-piece orchestra, it will cost $1500/hour of studio time with the musicians. This includes the orchestra, studio, recording engineer, conductor and session supervisor. Orchestration (tailoring the composition for individual instrumental parts in the orchestra), copying (extracting and printing individual instrument parts) and Midi transcription (transcribing a composer's Midi score into an orchestration) fees are additional. For this price in this situation, you can reasonably expect to get 3 minutes of music recorded per hour. So if you have a 30 minute score, it would take about 10 hours of recording time and cost about $15,000 with orchestration and copying being additional.

Pros: This is a very economical way to record your score. With careful planning and good orchestration and copying, you can get good results. The recordings are complete buyouts, with no residual payments or reuse fees. This option has had quality issues in the past. However, over time it is improving at a steady pace and is becoming a viable option for recording orchestral music at very reasonable rates.

Cons: The session is remote. There is a language barrier, although the score supervisor and/or the conductor speaks English. The players are sometimes marginal. Won't get quite as much music recorded per hour of session time as other options. Check with session supervisor to see if players will be able to play your complex passages.

Recording in Seattle, Salt Lake City and San Diego
These three cities offer services that are comparable to one another. The sessions are charged much differently than in Eastern Europe for economic reasons. Players run an average of $55/hour of session time, with studio costs, conductor, engineer, session supervisor, orchestator and copyist adding extra fees. In comparison to Eastern Europe, it boils down to about $3500 per hour of session time (again, orchestration and copying are extra). Although it sounds expensive in relation to the same thing in Eastern Europe, it's really quite a bargain when you consider the exchange rates between the US and Eastern Europe, and that because of the ability of the players and direct communication, you can record 4 to 5 minutes of music per hour. So for a 30 minute score, it would cost in the vicinity of $21,000 to $26,000.

Pros: Excellent musicians. Players can play fairly complex music the 2nd or 3rd time through. Good communication with musicians and contractor. Results can sound as good as most film scores. Complete buyout, no license or reuse fees. Large selection of rooms to record in.

Cons: Most will have to travel to location. Orchestration and copying fees will be more substantial than in Eastern Europe. Studio costs vary greatly.

Recording in London
World-class musicians, recording facilities such as Air Studios and Abbey Road Studios, and credits such as Episode 1: The Phantom Menace are the hallmarks of quality that recording orchestral music in London brings to the table. Recording in London is governed by the British Musician's Union. They set the rates for recording and reuse rights. A buyout is available, but costs significantly more than their standard rates, making this option mainly for high budget projects.

Pros: World-class musicians. Buyout fee available. Great technical staff at all major recording facilities ensuring a pristine recording. World-class recording rooms. Up to 8 minutes of recorded music per hour. Players can handle very hard passages of music.

Cons: Significant added expenses for travel and accommodations for all but native Londoners. Studio costs vary greatly. Fairly complex union/ payment agreements. Buyouts can be pricey.

Recording in Los Angeles
This is the pinnacle of recording orchestral music in the world. Because of the studio film and television production business located in Los Angeles, the finest recording musicians in the world are located there. The musicians in LA can play passages that most musicians would label "impossible". Their sight-reading ability is astonishing and breathtaking. The recording facilities are the best of the best -- although some in London are comparable. The technical staff are unsurpassed and the results are guaranteed to be excellent for all these reasons.

Pros: World-class musicians. The best sight-readers in the world. The best technical staff. The best of the best are in LA. It is possible to negotiate with the Recording Musician's Association (RMA) for a special multimedia deal that results in a buyout as these projects would be considered low budget.

Cons: Generally the most pricey option. Reuse fees for other media (soundtrack album, TV, etc.) are a must as well as royalty payments based on sales in excess of 50,000 and 100,000 units.