Over the weekend I gatecrashed my boyfriend’s (the lovely John Hunter) 10 year Uni reunion.
Although it had only been 8 years since I graduated from Bournemouth University, I didn’t feel out of place as I knew almost everyone there or had met them at least briefly during my stint at the Media School.
It was fascinating to catch up with the few that I’d lost touch with and see what they’d been up to in the meantime.
The Media School at Bournemouth University really is one of the better vocational media schools. The industry in London is replete with BU alumni. I’d take a guess that around 90% of the attendees at the reunion are now working in the media industry in some form or another relevant to the courses they read.
Got me thinking – how important is a formal, relevant education to the film composer? And specifically media-related music degrees?
What education, if any, is essential, rather than just a useful bonus, to one’s film music career?
How formal does that education have to be?
Can listening to film scores and watching films regularly be all the instruction today’s film composer needs? A subscription to Sound On Sound magazine for a tutorial on new equipment every now and again?
Do you have to be able to play an instrument? I mean, really? Surely, again, that’s just a bonus skill, something that gives you an insight into the available techniques and qualities of sound you can get, but isn’t absolutely essential in this day and age of samplers and lovely hulking great Mac Pros and 64-bit processing?