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I knew how it wanted to sound, so it was just simpler.
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The rest of it I did, just because it was fundamentally easier to go into the studio and record it myself. And all of the vibraphone solos – not the ensemble vibraphone, but the solos – is a great local percussionist and vibes player named Mark Duggan. Everything you hear in “Floral Fury” – that was a good friend and teacher, Alan Hetherington. Kristofer Maddigan: I did most of the percussion – I didn’t do any of the Brazilian percussion. Kristofer Maddigan: Yes, I played that part!Įmily: Did you perform all of the percussion yourself? One of my favorites is “The Legendary Ghost,” which has that great xylophone. All of the percussion on that one is live though.Įmily: I did really like the use of percussion in the score. Kristofer Maddigan: So I was really inspired by that, and wanted to go for that kind of sound – it made sense for the track. Have you seen those videos that have been going around on Youtube for a couple of years – Joe Rinaudo and the American Fotoplayer?
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So the “Mausoleum” track, and a bit of the stuff in “Coin-Op Bop” – logistically it made more sense to go the MIDI route for. Kristofer Maddigan: Everything was live, except a few small things – theremin – it’s hard to find a theremin player, you know. He thought that would be more exciting, and fit what MDHR were trying to do.Įmily: How much of the final recording was live? But, Chad wanted to go more of the thirties big band route. A lot of the music exactly matches what’s going on on-screen. Some of the cartoons have big band vibes, but many of them don’t – they’ll have orchestral, or a chamber orchestra kind of thing. Kristofer Maddigan: If you watch a lot of the old Fleischer cartoons, you can see what they were visually inspired by. Initially, the game was going to be a lot smaller, and it was a lot less intimidating – if I’d known what it was going to grow into four years ago when I started, it would have been a lot scarier!Īt that point, I said, okay, I’ll listen to the direction you guys want to go in, and we’ll go from there.Įmily: What kind of instructions or assignment were you given regarding the soundtrack?
#CUPHEAD BARBERSHOP TRIO PROFESSIONAL#
I think I was the only professional musician they knew! I was hesitant early on, because this wasn’t really in my comfort zone, but they persisted. I dove into this because Chad and Jared (Moldenhauer), the two brothers behind Studio MDHR, asked me to do it. I had done very, very little composition before this project. Photo Credit: Samantha Hurley of Samantha Hurley Imaging I play as much jazz as I can, but it’s a totally different scene and can be tough to maintain. The bulk of work that I do now is more symphonic-based. I ended up doing my undergrad in classical percussion. I still kept playing drumset, and went through high school playing a lot of rock, and did a lot of concert band stuff. So she compromised, and I started studying classical percussion. My mom said, well, maybe not instead, I did piano for a bit, but didn’t like it very much. I remember watching that so many times as a kid – I really wanted to be Liberty DeVitto, Billy Joel’s drummer. When I was super young I was a big Billy Joel fan, and we had the Billy Joel Live in Leningrad concert on VHS. David Bowie’s “Let’s Dance,” Billy Joel’s “Greatest Hits,” The Smurfs Album, and the Traveling Wilburys. I mentioned on a podcast I did last week that we only had 2 albums in the car, but she corrected me and reminded of two others. Kristofer Maddigan: To go back to the beginning, I grew up listening to my mom play a lot of piano. Interview CreditsĬoordination: Emily McMillan, Kristofer Maddigan Interview ContentĮmily: First, thanks for chatting with us! Can you tell us about your background in music? He talks about some of his approaches to composing for this unusual soundtrack, which included bringing together several talented musicians and some serious research to capture the very specific sound required by Cuphead‘s aesthetic. In this in-depth interview, we had the pleasure of sitting down with Kristopher to discuss his process behind composing for Cuphead. Widely praised for its rich sounds and authentic vintage approach, the soundtrack has already charted on Bandcamp, seen a deluxe vinyl release, and gathered a following of people who have fallen in love with its unique sounds and approach. Kristofer Maddigan Interview: A Jazzy, Ragtimey, Big-Band ScoreĬomposer Kristofer Maddigan‘s colorful soundtrack to Cuphead has taken off since its recent release.