Awaken With Awaken, I just kept it simple, and followed the melody in my head. The reason for the title, is that I was taking an afternoon nap with my 2 year-old son, and literally dreamed the melody. I awoke, and ran to my office […]

Steady Hands I wish I had more to say about this piece. I wrote it for a film that I was briefly associated with. As it turned out my music wasn’t right for the project — but I’m sure it will get used elsewhere at […]

The Still of Morning Free (for personal use only) high-quality download on SoundCloud. I wrote this song for the heroes of morning. Whether you’re an early morning runner, crossfitter, writer, or just going to work — our genesis starts, uninterrupted, in the early morning stillness […]

Very happy that M. Night Shyamalan is doing well again. Split, starring James McAvoy, has excellent reviews — much like his 2015 “found footage” thriller, The Visit. Ever since I saw, The Sixth Sense on a date with my girlfriend (now wife) M. Night has […]

I originally wrote all of the music for (what I now call) An Old Heart for another movie. It was a great opportunity, but as it turned out, my music was too sentimental and not a good fit for the film. I’ve written about that […]

I’m very excited to see Arrival — but with a 19 month-old at home, my movie watching has taken a serious hit. Even still, I’ve been a huge Denis Villeneuve fan ever since his movie Prisoners, which is also scored by Jóhann Jóhannsson. Principally, Jóhann Jóhannsson is […]

In a previous post I had mentioned that I had yet to watch Alejandro Inarritu’s, 21 Grams. I did, but made it a 1/4 of the way through. It’s well done and well acted, but I just can’t take prolonged sorrow in movies these days. […]

When you have kids (mine is 16 months) you really don’t go see movies anymore. My wife and I watch plenty of them — it’s just going to the cinema is nearly impossible. Even still, I’m jerry-rigging my busy teaching schedule to see Captain Fantastic this week. Captain […]

As I listen back to this performance of Radiohead’s True Love Waits, it flows just as easily — as when I first transcribed it. This arrangement took about 20 minutes for me to put together, and it was definitely a “flow state” experience: Flow is […]

To me, each of Jeff Nichols’ four movies exemplify perfectly crafted storytelling. I think of Nichols’ films with the same fondness as M. Night Shyamalan’s first few films. Out of the gates, M. Night, wrote and directed: The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, and Signs. All phenomenal […]

Often, what I try to do, is distill a song down to its core elements — then create a guitar arrangement from that. I began this blog in 2011 doing note for note arrangements —  but I soon realized nothing sounds as good (to me) […]

The White Whale Chant, by composer Roque Banos, is from Ron Howard’s In the Heart of the Sea. This song is very reminiscent of something composer Hans Zimmer would do. Zimmer has previously worked with Ron Howard on Rush and you can find my theme […]