On a more technical aspect, what's the process you go through to compose and score episodes of Brave and the Bold? Does the director or producer give you ideas and how do you split the work up between yourselves?

Lolita: We have full recording session on the show, and we also have two engineers who mix our music for these episodes - it’s a full music production. It’s an elaborate system were we spot the music with James and identify what kind of style were going to have for each show. Then we mark where the music starts and stops and create the music. About a week later we will come back and play the music for him. He will give us suggestions, critiques and say “Hey-its perfect don't change anything.” Then we hire the musicians and record the live parts and mix it. It's full on production for each and every twenty-two minute length cartoon.

Kris: We tend to write independently rarely sit down together, but there have been experiences were we would all three sit and share the piano. When working on these episodes, we all sit down and split the work up in an equal fashion. Sometime during the spotting session with James about the music, there will be a scene that really speaks to one of us and we’ll call dibs. We each have our own individual list of about a third of the music that has to be written independently; meanwhile we still make a point of keeping in touch with each other. Were always playing things for each other, sharing audio files during development so that we know which direction we're going. In the end, we have created a very homogenous sound.

Michael: We each have our own individual studios where we do our own writing, but this enables us to put a lot of attention on the overall score simultaneously. This process produces an exceptional product in the end and enables us to meet the short turn around time to complete post production on the episode.

Lolita: We have tried it in the past, were we will each take an episode. It’s creatively very satisfying, but on a practical level a composer or composers might be waiting for their episode to be completed, while other composers can be in a time crunch or panic mode. Splitting up the work is a more effective solution and ensures that all our resources are being exploited. This situation ensures we are focused everyday, putting the attention on making sure the music is right and not exhausting ourselves.

What are the deadlines like for each episode and which episode has been your favourite to score so far?

Michael / Lolita: The “Musical” episode is my favourite, because it’s kind of out of the box.

Michael: There's been some wonderful moments where we've had a great opportunity for music. For some of the fight scenes James will decide that we can compose the music as if it was choreographed to the fight and he will back-off the sound affects in favour of the musical stabs and other audio cues instead of the punches. It really lets the music shine in places for the episodes that we've scored so far.

Lolita: It’s nice because James does like to favour music in certain spots. There may be a scene that kind of sits there and even though it is good, it doesn't have as much colour as another scene. It’s nice for us to be able to bring a whole different dimension to a particular scene. James is always willing to take that stretch and it is very rewarding for us.

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I wanted to say a massive thanks to Kris, Michael and Lolita for taking the time to speak with me and what an amazing opportunity it was to speak with such professionals from the industry.

The full interview is included on this week’s Podcast and also includes my chat regarding other projects. Click here to listen…

The above sound clips are the property of Warner Bros. Animation and are not to be copied and reused without their permission.