The Little Crescendo
The Little Crescendo is a SCAD thesis film I've been on since early 2026. It should be stated that the project is still ongoing and this is just an iteration of what the film will look and sound like before it releases Spring of 2027.
Process
The core premise of this short, that a small automaton dances around an organist that is trying to swat him away musically, is the kind of idea that every composer dreams of getting to work through! It poses so many interesting musical challenges but most principally; how do I add music that conveys the action on screen while also expressing the emotional state of the characters at the same time?
I found my lifeline in the contrasting dynamic between the characters, the organist being rigid while the dancer is more expressive. I started by laying out a piano sketch, my thought being that if you can hear both characters on the same instrument it would be even more effective when I began orchestrating.
Which after a bit of arranging turned into...
The turnaround on this project was tight (only about two weeks) but the directors, Rye Girouard and Basil Tunstall, did me a huge favor by editing the animatic to the track Danse Macabre by Camille Saint-Saëns. That squared away a lot of the timing issues I may have had to sort through and so I was able to jump into some early drafts quite quickly.