Wearing Pants Again

Behind the Score: Composing for Film and TV with Sean Segal

• Lauren Siegal • Season 1 • Episode 7

Share episode

My guest is Sean Segal, a composer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist based in Los Angeles. He shares his journey from picking up guitar as a kid to composing scores for film and television, revealing how he blends technical skill with creative innovation.

In this episode, we discuss:
• How Sean discovered music and the story behind building his own guitar

• His education and journey into film and TV scoring

• His creative process and approach to scoring for different stories

• How he develops unique sounds and brings his own voice to each project

• Behind-the-scenes of composing for My Spy: The Eternal City and what it was like recording at the legendary Abbey Road Studios

• Practical tips for improving as a musician

Check out Sean's website.

Follow Sean on Spotify and Instagram.

For more information, visit the podcast episode webpage.

Lauren:

Hi everybody. Today I am so excited to be talking with Sean Segal. He is a composer, producer and multi-instrumentalist who has scored Emmy-winning documentaries and projects for Netflix, hulu, disney+ and more. In our conversation, sean shares his journey from first picking up the guitar to developing his own style as a composer for film and television. He's currently working with Martin Scorsese on a new show, so you'll get to hear about that as well. Sean is incredibly thoughtful about his craft and I am grateful that he took the time to share his story with us. So here is our conversation. Hey, sean, thank you so much for joining me. I'm so excited to have you on the podcast.

Sean:

Thanks for having me. It's great to be here.

Lauren:

So the guitar is your first love. How long have you been playing and how did you kind of discover your love for that?

Sean:

Yeah, guitar is where everything started for me, so I picked it up. Well, I don't know if you say you pick it up when you're five because you're very much forced to play when you're that age Depends how your parents are. But yeah, someone put a guitar in my hand when I was five and that kind of got me started for a little bit. Then I, you know, lost interest and I was playing video started for a little bit. Then I, you know, lost interest and I was playing video games for a while. Then, when I was 14, picked it back up or 13 or 14.

Sean:

I had a great teacher. His name was Ryder Buck and he taught me, you know, more than just the, the technique of it, kind of how to find the fun in it, and that, honestly, was the best lesson. And he was a local guy in La Cunada and he, he tragically passed. But you know, he gave me that spirit of musicality and finding the joy and all of it and and he got me hooked and then I've had, you know, a string of great mentors, ended up going to University of Michigan to play the guitar, studied jazz guitar over there, and so, yeah, that was kind of my intro to music was like playing blues music and Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughan and stuff like that, which kind of evolved into jazz, which just became my basis of knowledge for music, and then I've used that kind of in my film scoring stuff, and that's yeah, that's what I do now.

Lauren:

And I heard that you actually built your own guitar a while back. Can you tell me about that?

Sean:

Yeah, and I can show you too. I don't know how people are gonna consume this, but here's this guitar. So this was something I started when I was 14 or 15, probably 15, and I broke a string, so it's missing one string, so I can't play it right now, but I got a lot of help with it from my dad and guys down at the local guitar shop. Shout out grayson's, toontown and mantras. Uh, basically, I went out and I I thought it was really cool how, uh, brian may of queen made his own guitar out of a fireplace with his dad, and I wanted to do the same thing, because you know what's more personal than that.

Sean:

So I went out, I picked a piece of wood know what's more personal than that? So I went out, I picked a piece of wood, I drew a shape and failed the first time, but on the second try we, we got a, a good cut of, uh, african mahogany and uh, yeah, it took me like two years to do this thing. And then, at the end of the near the end of the process, my, uh, my grandma was pulling into the garage and it was hanging to dry and she knocked it off of its, its hanger. It fell crashing down on the ground and I had to redo the finish and the pain and it kind of set me back like five months after I was done of two years. But so that was tragic but it was. It was a great, amazing and story. And now I got my own guitar that I play every once in a while that no one else has. So it's pretty cool.

Lauren:

That's awesome, and what was your experience like studying music at the University of Michigan?

Sean:

Yeah, michigan was great. Michigan is definitely a powerhouse music school and they have an amazing music program for a bunch of different things. The jazz program was great. I mean, honestly, like I was never gonna be a professional jazz musician, but it was an amazing basis of my kind of musical knowledge and you know background.

Sean:

Because either here's the deal if you want to continue doing music when you're 17 years old, you know, leaving high school, there are only a few options. One is you don't major in music and you study something sensible and you try to pick up music outside in your extracurricular time. But that wasn't enough for me and I think a lot of kids think the same way, and so they want to go into music in some way. But more or less in most of these music schools you have a choice of either going classical or jazz. Those are basically the two idioms that people allow, that academia allows, and so I chose jazz.

Sean:

A couple of schools have pop programs. Usc and NYU and Berkeley are great if you want to study pop music. But Michigan was calling me. It was a great school. I got the opportunity to study things outside of music that were excellent there. Plus, it was a great atmosphere of a college environment and met a lot of like-minded people that I still work with today and friends that I still have, and so that's why I wanted to go. I wanted to go to a great music school, but it also had to be a good school, you know, aside from the music, and that's why I did Michigan.

Lauren:

And did you always know that you wanted to go into scoring for film and TV?

Sean:

Yeah, yeah. But I thought maybe that that's something I would start when I was like 60. And you know I'd be a rock star before that, I'd be Danny Elfman. And then you know you, slowly you get asked to do that once you hang up your guitar. But then kind of the opportunities started happening sooner where I really wanted to do this master's program at USC and I didn't want to wait until I was 50 to do that. Oh, hey, hey kitty. What's the cast name again.

Lauren:

Milo.

Sean:

Milo, what's up, milo, nice cameo. And so, yeah, I just I went straight into the Masters. I was lucky enough to get in and, you know, after that, instead of stopping to become a rock star again, I just figured I'm just gonna keep doing this scoring thing because it was a blast and then I was having a great time and I really liked the people involved, and so that's, yeah, I really I think I wanted to do it since high school. I think I even wanted to do that master's program at USC since high school, since I had known that people like you know, christoph Beck, who scored Frozen, or Ludwig Goranson, two-time Oscar winner, or Marco Beltrami some of these really great composers came out of that program and I've kind of saw it as like a feeder into, into doing this kind of stuff. So, yeah, I always kind of did, but I didn't know when or why or how it was going to happen. But now we're doing it.

Lauren:

Now we're doing it. So now you've worked on projects for Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, to name a few.

Sean:

How did you approach your early projects and start shaping your own style as a composer. Yeah well, I come from the camp of having written underneath other composers. Which is one way that you can come up as a composer is to be either a ghostwriter or an additional writer. Basically the same thing, just varying degrees of credit involved for yourself. So I was really fortunate out of college, out of my master's at USC, to get a job with an amazing composer named Jackson Greenberg, who I still work with currently and, you know, started writing a lot of additional music for him over time. Him over time started out with mostly assistant tasks, and then you build trust and we get a vibe for each other's, you know artistic kind of uh, sensibilities, and then you know I sort of learn what he likes and I start writing that like that, and then I start writing for other people too in in that time. Um, and then you know I've gotten some of my own gigs under my own name.

Sean:

As you know, I use the term marquee composer. The guy's name is on the marquee. Sometimes it's me, sometimes someone else, but yeah, really it's like I honed whatever skills I have now by writing for others, which is a great way to learn, because one, you get to learn how other people do things and you get to learn, you get to see what it's like at a much higher level than you would be able to just jumping in with your own gigs even doing, you know, especially if you're doing things like short films or lower budget stuff, you know, which is how most people start. That's all great, but it's also really nice to see what it's like when, at the higher levels, you know, and that's really valuable for young guys like me. So, yeah, that's sort of how it's been. Is mostly just stuff for other people and you know, honing my skills, doing that, figuring out what it is I liked, and then bringing that to my own projects, my skills, doing that, figuring out what it is I liked, and then bringing that to my own projects.

Lauren:

So when you are composing, when, you're, you know, doing a song for a movie or TV show how do you begin the whole process and what does that look like?

Sean:

Yeah, so it can be so many different things. I mean, if we're, if I'm, producing a song for an artist, it's a completely different thing than approaching the soundtrack score. So for like a score, usually what happens is you get hired and then you have a conversation with the director or the producers about what they're going for, what the vision is, and then it's your job to kind of interpret that and bring your you know what makes you special to that project and be able to do that musically. And then, yeah, so you start concepting.

Sean:

I'm a really big fan of concept scores where you say you know this, this movie is about a basketball team, so we'll record a basketball hitting the floor and we'll chop that up and turn it into a beat and make it into music and you know concept stuff. So that's stuff that I'm a big fan of and that is done. You know at the beginning of a project and then as you move through it, you get to use those sounds and that kind of shapes how the score works. But that's the process of concepting. And then you work with the director and if, hopefully, everything is going well and they like the approach you're taking and things are getting approved and it's not too much of like a difficult battle. Hopefully it's as seamless as possible. It's never perfectly seamless, but hopefully it's. It's not too bad. And then yeah that's. And then you hopefully make it to the finish line a month or two or a year later and everyone's happy.

Lauren:

From your end when you're in the process, like when you're creating that, are you just? Are they just showing you portions of the movie just before it has music? And then you think about like you build the song around that.

Sean:

Yeah, it's, it's all different every single way you can imagine it. So sometimes there's a finished movie that they can just show you. Hey, this is basically it and this is what we've gotten. We're really close to being done. Sometimes we are hired just when it's a script Like, for example, there's this show we're doing with Martin Scorsese called the Saints. Martin Scorsese presents the Saints and we had no picture when we started writing music on that, and this was last year-ish, a little before, a little over a year ago now, we started writing for that and there's no picture. So we have no scenes yet. We just have the concept and the idea and we used other stuff that he's done, as you know, maybe touch points of what could it be like, what you know might work in this universe, this environment, and then, yeah, you just start testing stuff and you throw stuff at the wall and see what works. Yeah, wait, is that sort of getting at the question?

Lauren:

Yeah, so do you have a preferred way of doing it? Where do you like to do it? Side on scene? Or is it more helpful for you to actually have something to look at?

Sean:

Having something to look at is pure inspiration. So, like I, I always prefer that because, reading a script, you get a sense. You start to build the movie in your own head. I know michael giacchino has said that. Um, you know a guy who won the oscar for up and he's an amazing composer. She did fantastic for, uh, he says, and he's a great filmmaker in his own right. He's directed some stuff and he says you know, he doesn't like to write too early because he'll make up his own movie in his head even reading the same script that everyone else is going from. But when you deliver someone else's vision, it's a completely different movie, it's a different thing. So you got to be careful that you don't take something and run with it just for what you want it to be, but you're addressing what it is at the actual, you know, end of the process, once they have picture.

Sean:

So, I like seeing what it became, not just what I think it could be. That's sometimes a tricky challenge.

Lauren:

So, as you mentioned, you're currently working with Martin Scorsese. What has that been like and what can you tell us about that project?

Sean:

It's been pretty cool. It's been remarkably chill actually. Yeah, so last year I started writing for the Saints and what's been fun about it is it's kind of ancient music and so I've never done anything in that style before something really old. So you know, I've really gotten invested in buying instruments that sound old or things that are kind of cool of that period or era, or sometimes I'm mixing eras and periods, but if things sound like they could fit, then you can kind of get away with it. You don't have to be the music historian about it, you don't have to be super accurate, but like, sometimes doing that is fun, whereas you could use an acoustic guitar for a sound.

Sean:

I found this thing, I picked it up in London it's. It's some kind of lute ish kind of thing it's. It might be called like a man mandocello, where it's kind of likeute-ish kind of thing. It might be called like a mandocello, where it's kind of like a mandolin, but it's cello-sized, tuned like a cello, which is pretty cool. So you get, you know, interesting sounds and every string is doubled like a mandolin and every string is doubled like a mandolin. So it kind of sounds old, it sounds like Renaissance period stuff, so we can have fun with that.

Sean:

And then I picked up this old thing over here which is called the one in the back is called a sitarra and you just do a big strum and it sounds great and it has a bunch of sympathetic strings. So it just has this unique cool sound. And then you know, we just try to use old cool things and and mess around and have fun with stuff that brings a new kind of flavor to something that could otherwise sound like a million other things. It it could sound like Game of Thrones, but what's our take on that Doing stuff that's new? So Jackson's an amazing producer and he can make really cool modern sounds. So I try to follow him in that, but we try to add acoustic flair to it, things that are real and live and not just in our computers in the box.

Lauren:

So that instrument that you just played, that's the mandolin in the box.

Sean:

So that instrument that you just played.

Lauren:

That's the mandolin, yeah.

Sean:

Are the chords. Is that the same as guitar or is it different? It's different. So this has eight strings, but you could think of it more like if it was four strings. It would be like the same tuning as a cello, but with frets on it, which is pretty cool.

Lauren:

So did you just teach yourself how to play that?

Sean:

Yeah, and I'm not like amazing at it, but you know I played the guitar, so I'm used to frets and I'm used to strings and playing stuff like that. But yeah, there was another one, a cool one.

Sean:

This is called a taggle harpa this guy and this is like a Nordic instrument that's also ancient, and I had a guy make this for me in Russia this year for the show, and you know you can, it's kind of like a cello, but also completely different. You can see there's no neck here, these strings just float, but then you know, it's very dark, very like kind of menacing sounding and that's. You know, this instrument is like thousands of years old.

Sean:

So stuff like that that could have been a cello, but why not try something different? And people aren't as familiar with that sound.

Lauren:

So what does it look like when you guys are composing? Are you just in a room with all these instruments just kind of messing around?

Sean:

Yeah, it's like the best part of what I do is that I never had to stop being a kid, playing with toys it's just more toys and always trying to access, kind of, your inner child and what's fun about something, or trying to. I mean, we're emotional interpreters so we have to, you know, dive into a headspace just like an actor would or a director would. We, we have to embody some other emotion and kind of synthesize it and put it into music form and you know you don't need toys, you don't need all this stuff. And then on this side oh, on this side, you can see it. You know, these are my some synthesizers and an old, vintage piano, electric piano, and so when you can have access to those kind of external sources of inspiration, it makes the process more fun and more of a fingerprint your own fingerprint on it, other than you know, just another sound that everyone else has on the computer, yeah, so that's why it's fun.

Sean:

We just out in a room. Usually it's a very solitary lifestyle and so we're always, you know, kind of banging at the doors to get out at the end of the day and go see and talk to somebody. But the process is really fun, especially when you hit the zone and you're in here and you reach for different things that are around. Yeah, it can be a blast.

Lauren:

And is it a whole team of people that are around? Yeah, it can be a blast. And is it a?

Sean:

whole team of people that are working on this. Yeah, it can be. Teams can be very large or they can be one person, depending on budget and depending on who's doing it. Different camps of composers have different needs and have different amounts of people on the teams. Yeah, it always changes, but that's why, like I say, I'm part of a couple of teams and then sometimes I get the opportunity to have my own per project here and there, but that's a great way. It also allows more people to be able to be in this business. If every composer could do the job on their own, there would be a lot fewer people able to work in film music, so it's a great opportunity for others to be able to hang out whether it's just as a music editor or an assistant or an additional writer or a co-writer.

Sean:

There's a lot of different ways that you can get involved and I know you were also a composer for my Spy.

Lauren:

What was that project like?

Sean:

yeah. So that was like taking a break from all my normal usual stuff to go do a movie with my dad, which was incredible, and it was a very odd process of getting it. Of course, you know, I think me and my dad kind of looked at it as, hey, this might be our one chance to work with each other, if we ever wanted to do this and make this happen. And so how can we try to do that? Obviously, he can't just waltz in and say, hey, this is my composer, he's never done a big movie on his own, but you need to hire him. So that didn't happen.

Sean:

But what did happen was a producer kind of knew the situation and said, hey, here's what I'll do. I'm going to put your name in. Obviously, they're going to do their vetting and they'll do whatever, but I'll try to get you a meeting, you know, and we'll see what happens. And so in the meeting I said, look, guys, I know I haven't done much, but what if you know we do? I'll take time off my job now quit my job and I'll demo the score for you guys and if you like it, you can buy it. That was generally the. It was like I'll take five months off, write this whole thing. I think it was like 80% or 85% and I had to finish. And then they test the movie and if it tests well in the score and everything, then they'll give me a deal, then they'll buy it and then we can maybe record it.

Lauren:

What do you mean if it tests?

Sean:

well. So movies, before they come out, they get tested in front of live audiences and then that has a big impact on marketing and additional changes that need to be made to the movie. So every major movie gets tested a lot. Avengers movies, for example, will start testing it the movie because of. However it'll test test, two-thirds of the movie might change. They might reshoot over half of the thing because people didn't like the way certain things played out. And there are massive reshoots, especially on those big, big, major movies, because of largely testing.

Sean:

Testing is huge and so the way things test is kind of the only way that studios can gauge ahead of time whether something is going to be a success or not, because at the end of the day, this is a business and they need to manage money and everything like that.

Sean:

So, yeah, so it ended up testing well, myspy ended up testing well and Amazon bought the score for me. I'm super grateful to the music department over there, anton and Christina. They were incredibly kind and trusting of me and after it tested well, they also said, by the way, I know we said we might not have wanted to record this live, but now that we've seen it and heard it, we want to go record it at Abbey Road in London, and so they, you know, we mobilized and did the big, huge thing and recorded at Abbey Road, which is like the oldest studio and one of the biggest in the world, and it's just the best. You know, it was an amazing experience and to do that, the whole family came out, so it was a family affair. It was like a once in a lifetime, even if I ever get to, do it again.

Lauren:

It'll never be like that, so it was just such a special experience. That's awesome. Um, do you have a favorite project that you've worked on so far?

Sean:

that was. I mean, nothing probably ever will be as special as that, even though it kicked my ass, um, because I was kind of learning how to fly the plane. I was building the plane while I was flying it, right, and but I learned so much on it. But also I, you know, had this very unique experience of being able to do it with with my father, who I've learned everything about filmmaking from, and so that will probably never be topped and, and you know, we got to go record it, and at the highest level, and so that was amazing.

Lauren:

Do you have a favorite part of the process?

Sean:

I mean, if we get the opportunity to record ever and that doesn't have to be a huge 80,90 piece orchestra, it can be three people in a room that's always so gratifying, especially when you've brought them material. Sometimes we'll do recording sessions at the beginning of a project and we don't have much material, melodic material, yet to record. Maybe we don't have themes super locked down yet, and those are fun too. But the stuff when you've been working on a project for a long time with the really bad fake instruments and then you get to go record it with people who are masters at their instruments, it comes to life and it's like a robot coming to life for the first time. It's very special and that's, I think, what it's all about.

Sean:

And then, second to that, maybe you know, experiencing it with the filmmakers, and if they enjoy it, that's always a great experience too. Yeah, getting to connect with people, you know that's also. It's kind of the same thing in reverse. We're bringing something to life for them that they've seen a hundred times, and then they're seeing it in a new way, and that's that's really special too, because nobody watches a movie more than the director does. They've seen it, you know, hundreds of times. Um, the editors too, and so when we can bring some music and maybe show them their story in a new light, that's. That's pretty cool, especially if they enjoy the direction that we took it, if not not always so fun.

Lauren:

So you said you started guitar when you were five. When did you start playing the piano? Did you teach yourself?

Sean:

I took some lessons for piano to test out of a college class, but that was like some scales and that was about it. But I was, I was really locked in on the, on the four octave scales and Then really everything that I know Working wise now is I learned either on YouTube or taught myself. Because as good as learning the fingerings for scales is and how important that is for just generally general vocabulary, you're not going to really learn music that way and it's, I think it's really hard to learn kind of the spirit of music and in lessons especially the way some old school teachers try to do lessons where it's it's really about learning technique and form. You're not really learning a lot about musicality.

Sean:

Uh, even if they are whipping musicality into you by saying, oh, if the dynamics here aren't right or do this or this, I don't, I don't find that to be really like developing your musical soul. I think that kind of has to be done alone and it's really easy to do these days because youtube is free for everybody, um, so you can just learn instruments whenever, however, rewind it, you don't have to pay someone that much money. That said, it's great if you want to show someone how far, you're getting along with your technique and your skills and if you know, it's helpful to you for someone to point that out like what you could do better, that's where lessons can come in now and be really um helpful, but uh but yeah no piano I started.

Sean:

I started playing really late college, if not just my masters, and then and to now, because, uh, to be honest, most of my day is spent on a piano. I wish it was. I wish we scored on guitars more, but we really score on pianos so I played clarinet um throughout middle school and high school.

Lauren:

and thinking about, like, when I, when I was in band, and you're playing um a piece of music and there's so many different instruments, how do you and then you're the one who's in charge of composing that, how do you even start that? And then do you just write each instrument? Do you do all of them together or do you do one at a time?

Sean:

Yeah, so I think what you're talking about is something called orchestration, and orchestration is an amazing, awesome field. It is so great and people who are orchestrators I envy them because it seems pretty fun. But so, to answer your question, yes, a little bit. Sometimes, like you know, we might be thinking of the orchestration in the back of our minds while we're writing something Like, for example, I know that in this little ditty that I'm writing, I want the top note to be a violin, or I want it to be strings and the melody is taken by clarinet right, or I want these short notes to be pizzicato strings. That kind of stuff is orchestration, and I forget. That kind of stuff is orchestration and I forget. Oof, one of my classical friends will correct me, but I can't remember which famous classical composer who was a great orchestrator said that really orchestration and composing are the same thing, and I think probably no time has that been more true than now, because we live in the age of recorded music, where the printed, recorded track that's playing to you is everything. That's everything. Because we live in a space now where we have headphones and such high quality listening equipment, speakers and stuff. We're listening on the best sound sources that we ever have been able to. I'm just talking about people at home, so like we can be detailed in the way we produce music and produce scores, and so that is also orchestration. Having cool interesting pads underneath cool interesting production is also orchestration. Having cool, interesting pads underneath cool interesting production is also orchestration.

Sean:

So I'm kind of deviating from the question, but I think it's all kind of in one. You know, we're thinking of orchestration. We're thinking, yeah, clarinet needs to be this note when we're writing it. But a lot of the details get filled out later, exactitudes of what instruments are playing, what in the line you know, is second violin taking which harmony? Is viola taking this or that or whatever. That sometimes gets figured out later and it takes a really good orchestrator to to do that kind of minutia. Well, I do it at a very basic kind of stupid level, but I can get it across to someone who does know what they're doing and can help me out.

Sean:

Um, but yeah, no, orchestrating kind of is composing, kind of is producing these days it's all the same. And so I think we've given rise to something called the producer-composer, and it's not a knock on anybody to say that they can't write the old-fashioned way. But I think this new generation has a lot of people who grew up writing music on computers, making cool sounds, and that's kind of the voice of how they compose music. It's not all, just like john williams with a bunch of cool old-school orchestration techniques, and it's not all. It doesn't also have to sound like handle or revel or you know, you name it beethoven. It can sound like hip hop, it can sound like anything, it can sound like 60s folk, you know. So yeah, it's all one, it's all one. That's how I like to think of it.

Lauren:

So obviously you do this for work and I assume that you also enjoy playing music for fun. So how do you kind of balance both and do you do you write your own music for fun out just outside of work?

Sean:

Ah, yes, so that's the kind of sad answer I give people when they ask what my hobbies are. My hobby is also music. My, you know, basically my life is music for work, music for fun, and then, when I can, hanging out and seeing my friends, and then that doesn't leave a ton of time for all the other things. So, yes, I do music for fun as well. I've been really diving into learning about modular synths, which is what this guy is right here. It's a bunch of different little pieces that you all buy separately and then together combines into one kind of synthesizer, one instrument. It's really cool and it's unwieldy and it's very strange and chaotic, but it can create some things that you kind of can't do with anything else, which I find, for some reason I find very fascinating. My last kind of year and a half has been spent kind of diving into that stuff and learning about it, watching videos and tutorials and stuff on YouTube about how it works, and so that I would really consider that one of my hobbies, because it doesn't come into my work stuff all that much, it's not as much a part of my day to day, but yeah, it's a hobby, same with sitting down on a piano and playing, you know, elton John songs is not something that really technically relates to what I do every day, but it also all does right. So it's also all mixed together because everything that you practice and do will eventually show up in what you're writing on a day-to-day. So, yes, it is the hobby. It is a hobby and my job.

Sean:

But it's kind of hard to distinguish when one transitions into being the other. You know, is it 6 pm now it's hobby time? I don't really know. But I also I try to make some music. I was making more music for myself earlier this year when we had some downtime after the fires and the strikes, and you know the strikes kind of hit post-production on like a five to six month delay. So we weren't working for a little bit of time. It was a little bit drier. But so in that time I was getting into modular and I was getting into writing some tracks that were just for me and for fun. Um, I usually don't sing on my stuff, but I was just making stuff for like, hey, what? What other fun sounds can I have that I don't need to be paid to do this right now for you know?

Lauren:

Yeah, do you ever do you write songs with lyrics? Yeah, occasionally have it in a minute. I used to do that a. Do you write songs with lyrics?

Sean:

Yeah, occasionally I have it in a minute. I used to do that a lot more when I was doing more singer-songwriter stuff, but I love being in sessions with artists who are obviously doing lyrics and doing all that stuff. I love helping other people achieve their vision with stuff like that too.

Lauren:

Do you have a favorite concert that you've been to, and then do you have a bucket list concert.

Sean:

Whoa, that's crazy Bucket list concert. Okay, the bucket list. Do they have to be like? Does it have to be someone who's like, actually performing, Like it would be feasible, or just anybody ever?

Lauren:

Oh, I guess it could be anybody ever.

Sean:

Oh, seeing Led Zeppelin in the 70s would have been pretty cool. Seeing Led Zeppelin back in the 70s would have been pretty amazing. Or maybe seeing the Grateful Dead back then in like Oregon or in Europe or one of those places that those places seem like kind of great crowds to have been in. Best concerts I've been to. Honestly and I know I'm giving all kind of boomer answers but the Rolling Stones really knocked me away when I saw them in 2016 at Coachella or Old Chella Desert Trip, it was called. They might as well have been 25, not 75 at the time, especially Mick Jagger. I mean he was like front man, one of the best front men I've ever seen like dancing, running around the stage, doing all these crazy things. That was great.

Sean:

My first concert ever was the Black Eyed Peace, which was pretty funny and fun, and now, looking back on it, I'm kind of nostalgic for that music. So that one comes to mind. But yeah, yeah. And then I'm glad I got to see Paul McCartney. Then, you know, we got to see some of the greats and yeah, I don't know, the classic rock stuff came to mind immediately, but I've seen some other great ones.

Lauren:

I'll just leave it at that, do you? Do you think that somebody has to know a lot about music theory to be good at guitar?

Sean:

no, not at all. Not at all. You don't have to know music theory. Will it help you? Probably it'll probably help you a lot and it'll probably help you get better faster, but it won't make you any more musical musicality is pretty much just inside you and, like what you're, the product of what you listen to and your taste. I don't think you've become more musical by knowing theory. I've listened to a lot of really intelligent, smart people who know a lot of music theory that aren't very interesting to listen to because the theory is kind of the point of what they're doing and that somehow is kind of out of touch with, I think, what's so human about music. That's not to say I don't respect what they're doing and I have two degrees in music, so I very much respect music theory and I love it, and I was so obsessed with why chords worked when I was, you know, 17 still and you know, up to now I've always been really interested in why harmony works and what is the magic and the secret of music. But, and even as.

Sean:

I've learned it, and I've kind of not all the secrets, but and even as I've learned it, enough, kind of not all the secrets, but he's enough. Even as I've started to chip away at that, you know, iceberg, it just I kind of keep coming back to the idea that you still just have to listen to your soul, because that's really all you have at the end of the day. However, it's nice to know that when you, you you know I'm trying to think of a metaphor when you are at a band rehearsal and someone calls out some chords and you can, just you can jump in and start to hang right away. Or when you write something, you know, hey, this sounds kind of funny. But why does it sound funny? Oh well, I guess, honestly, in this key, this chord should be minor, or maybe I'm borrowing from this key.

Sean:

You know I'm getting esoteric now, but that's. These are the kinds of examples of the things that might help you with music theory, but you absolutely don't need it. The Beatles didn't know much. I mean, george Martin helped him out, but, like you know, there are plenty of examples of great musicians who couldn't tell you why certain chords worked. They just like the sound of it, and those are the artists people listen to.

Lauren:

You know, I think there's something to say for that um, I think I I heard that you were once in a band. Um, is that true? And do you still do live performances like? Do you still do any of that?

Sean:

ah, yes, I've been in a few bands. I've been in a few bands. There was a band I was in in college that one of our songs kind of went viral on tiktok and now it has like a few hundred thousand plays on Spotify.

Lauren:

That was like as I was like what's it called?

Sean:

The band was called Mood Swing one word and the song was called Bursley Girl and I sang on it. I did sing on it and I produced it, but that was kind of the last time that I ever did that seriously. And then since then I've sung backup for people performing live and mostly played guitar for people performing, just because I still love to play guitar and it's great to be on a stage and hear an amplifier turned up loud and feel the energy of a crowd. That is like a drug. That's an amazing experience. However, I am happy to trade that in. If it means I get to score music every day too, that's fine. I'm happy with either.

Lauren:

This one is great for me too, do you get nervous when you're performing in front of people.

Sean:

Yeah, yeah. But something happened where, eventually, I played so much guitar that once I started playing of it, things became less scary and less anxious. You know the lead-up to getting on the stage and, oh, am I gonna remember the song, am I gonna remember the chords? That part is scary. And then I started to find that as you just start playing, that stuff goes away and it just becomes about the music, and the music is stuff that you understand because you've practiced it and rehearsed it. Um, that part was never scary, you know, um, especially after a while and that, and then it became fun.

Lauren:

If you can relax, then it becomes fun so I, I picked up guitar and just kind of started teaching myself, yeah, just through the internet, or trying to learn, um, how to read tabs for songs that I wanted to learn, and um, and then I started taking lessons a couple of months ago but I cause I wanted to try and get to the next level. Um, I felt like I had kind of plateaued and I feel like lessons have helped as far as, like, my finger picking technique, because I was doing it incorrectly. So it's been helpful for that. But then, you know, I like I'll practice in my apartment and then I go to my lessons and I play for my teacher, but I still feel I feel like I mean, I, and I almost feel like I I am not going anywhere.

Lauren:

Do you have, you know, any advice, uh, for how somebody can kind of get to the next level? Because I will say also, um, no, I was going to say a separate question, um which is that I do also think it would be really fun to be in a band. So I'm like I don't know, I don't know how to, how to make that happen.

Sean:

Oh, man, ok, there's a lot there. Here's the question, and I think you might have started to answer the first one, my first question with your second one, which is what is your end goal with, with playing guitar? Are you looking to be able to play and sing, maybe front in a band, something like that?

Lauren:

Is that the idea? Well, that was initially the dream, as I thought I wanted to be in an indie rock band. A lot of the songs that I want to learn, it's mostly kind of acoustics and I thought, well, maybe I kind of acoustics. And I thought, well, maybe I could just do. You know, if I can't find people to form a band, then I'll just do my own thing. And the idea of performing in front of people, like playing and singing, is horrifying, and so that's why I haven't done it. But I guess I think that would probably be the next step. It's just really scary to think about that it is.

Sean:

Well. Then I have some follow-up questions for you, Okay, so? I I didn't mean to turn this into a self-help, I don't know, but it's fun and, by the way, I think a lot of people are in your situation and, if anything, if I can help with that in any way, that's great, I mean, um, so the follow-up questions are uh, so can you play these songs through and sing and like, get through it with no mistakes?

Lauren:

I so some of the harder I I'm, I could do easy songs like songs. I mean, I actually don't give myself enough credit Like I can, and maybe it's not perfect, but like I can get through it. But I'm trying to learn. I'm trying to learn this song, angeles, by Elliot Smith I don't know if you know that song, like it's really challenging.

Sean:

So good luck with with those guitar parts. I mean, those are, those are tricky.

Lauren:

Yeah, but like basic songs where it's just chords and strumming, I can do that, and I have a ukulele too, so I can do that.

Sean:

I think the best thing you can be doing right now is focus on a few songs that are on I won't even say easy, but on the more playable side and get those down and really enjoy playing them, the performing just for yourself, just for yourself. Play them back and Do it. If you can practice with a metronome, at least you know playing as fast. This is great, especially for guitar parts that you just need to practice Playing with a metronome, because it'll keep you honest and you're probably this is my one piece of advice for people that are getting stuck and plateauing is that, um, you need to start upping the difficulty, not of what you're playing, but, uh, holding yourself accountable to timing with a metronome, and then start recording yourself on your phone and listening back, and if you're hearing things, you're saying oh I'm, I'm slowing down here.

Sean:

I can hear, or I missed that chord or I didn't love the way I sang that one part of that verse. I guess I've never been doing that right. Those are your times where you can take a look at it and fix it, and that's when you'll start to make really impressive gains, because you're holding yourself accountable and then you're starting to listen to yourself as other people will, and once you start enjoying to listen to yourself uh, meaning that it's sounding good to you then I think it'll take a lot of the pressure off performing for others, because you have the sense in the back of your mind hey, it's sounding good to me, and that's all I've got at the end of the day in my heart that I think it sounds pretty good and so I want to share that, and that that takes a bit of the edge off. That's my one piece of advice.

Lauren:

Okay, yeah, because I was gonna say, I mean, it's one thing to think that that you sound good, but then to get in front of other people's like, oh what if I actually suck?

Sean:

Yeah, and oftentimes we think we sound good when it's just us in a room playing. You know guitar, but that's when recording becomes your best friend, because you will. You'll hear things that you probably didn't hear before, and then you'll start to know whether you're doing it right or not, I think, because we all have good here. Anyone who loves music probably has a pretty good ear to know if they're good or not once they listen back, but not in the moment. I don't think we're good judges of ourselves in the moment.

Lauren:

Yeah, or sometimes, when I'm just yeah, I need to, like you know, hold myself accountable cause I'll just kind of be messing around. But then I know, don't play it all the way through and don't play with a metronome, or if I mess up then I'll start over, which is you can't do that if you're performing. Obviously.

Sean:

That's me too. I'm a chronic noodler, as they call it, on the guitar. I love to noodle around without really playing a song and then, if I do play a song, I'll play 15 seconds and move on to the next, just because I played the one part I like. Yeah, it's that's. It's a bad habit. When I was playing in bands, I started practicing playing whole songs all the way through. That helps, because it also helps with your finger strength, being able to play something for three minutes, you know, or, god forbid, a half hour if you're doing a little bit of a set at a coffee shop or something.

Sean:

Um, yeah, so you just got to be strict with the practice and then the practice makes the playing more fun as soon as you start getting better at that, and then everything comes together um with all the projects that you've worked on.

Lauren:

What does success look like to you personally?

Sean:

Wow, that's a big question.

Lauren:

And you've got to end with a big question.

Sean:

Yeah, and is there a meaning to life? Is there anything after this? Yeah, so I think I've always thought well, at least since being a quote unquote professional that this is such a fragile thing and so many people are trying to do this, to show up to a studio every day and write music and make money from it and pay my rent with it, and kind of. As long as I'm able to do that for the rest of my life, I think I imagine I'll be fulfilled and happy. I think so I'd also, but then the caveat is I'd love to have a family, and so I'd probably need to be able to support that too. I'd love to support that. So, yeah, I might need a little more money later and these gigs might have to get a little bigger, but but that's that's.

Sean:

The success is being able to live a happy, healthy life and doing it with music, with music as my main thing, because really I got it. It's like I got to be doing this eight hours a day or more, because I'm not the kind of person who could go to a day job, come back and then put my extra hours into music. I need to put my main energy, my main core hours into music. It's just who I am and that's what makes me happy. So as long as I'm able to do that, that's success. No more, no less. No awards, no accolades. Those things are nice little merit badges to put on your, your suit. But that's that's it. You know, the sash doesn't have to be filled by at the end of the day, it just has to be happy.

Lauren:

Love that, and where can listeners hear more of your work or follow along with what you're doing next?

Sean:

yeah, okay, we did. I co-scored a show for Netflix called race for the crown. Sorry, take me a second because they went through a name change. It's called race for the crown. Sorry, it took me a second because they went through a name change. It's called Race for the Crown, a horse racing show. Second season of Martin Scorsese Presents the Saints is going to be on Fox Nation in the coming months. I worked on a movie called Get Us Home with the Jonas Brothers. That'll be coming out on Hulu probably around Christmas time. It's a Christmas movie. If I had to say I'm working on a season, I actually can't talk about that one yet. We'll see what happens there. But people could check out my music on Spotify. You can see what I'm working on an IMB or on my website, sean Siegel musiccom. Wow, that feels very professional to plug my my calm like that and then than that you can give me follow on Instagram. That's probably where I'm posting anything that I'm doing.

Lauren:

Awesome. Well, thank you, Sean, for joining me today. It's been great having you.

Sean:

Thanks, lauren, it's been lovely chatting.

Lauren:

You can find all of Sean's links in the show notes, so be sure to check that out. I want to thank Sean for joining me today and sharing his journey and I appreciate the advice he gave at the end there. I hope that this conversation perhaps inspires you, to take that next step in your own creative journey. Thank you for listening and I will talk to you next time.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Lauren Siegal

Host