As expected, Adele’s Skyfall is a proper Bond theme and incredibly well done. Skyfall uses a mixture of the You Know My Name (Bm – G – E) progression, the 007 theme, and Adele’s sultry vocals to pull off a perfect blend of several past […]

My observation is that the iPhone (of which I’m an owner and a fan) has created an entire generation of “walkers” — or as the zombies are referred to in AMC’s The Walking Dead. We see them everywhere, and you might be one: a human-being […]

Sounding like equal parts George Michael and U2, Muse’s new single Madness, is an unbelievably crafted pop-song.  Coldplay front-man Chris Martin praises it as “Muse’s best song ever” and there’s even a Phil Collins-esque (bump bump, bump bump, bump bump) drum fill into the final chorus crescendo. […]

Extreme Ways is the default theme song for the Bourne franchise — specifically the conclusion of each movie. Just when you think Jason Bourne or (in Legacy’s case) Arron Cross has disappeared — the sampled violins strike and Bourne is on the move. To memorize […]

Like many of you, I find myself still listening to the big three from the movie Drive. I particularly enjoy listening to Nightcall — oddly enough, while I’m driving — at night. Having listened to Nightcall dozens of times, I couldn’t help but wonder what it […]

The score for Snow White and the Huntsman was released on Tuesday the 29th and at the time of this posting, it’s Friday June 1st. That’s a very quick production time to go from transcribing and arranging James Newton Howard’s Snow White, to posting a […]

[Updated November 2021] Free audio download on SoundCloud. This piece is available on all streaming services including: Spotify & Apple. Greensleeves: a brief history Believed to be composed in the late 16th/early 17th century, ‘Greensleeves’ never began it’s many incarnations as a Christmas song. It […]

Riding Horses (This post and tab have been updated as of 8/31/20) Riding Horses is one of my favorite selections from Gustavo Santaolalla’s iconic, Academy Award winning score for Brokeback Mountain. It’s truly one Gustavo Santaolalla’s most beautiful melodies. The actual piece is two separate […]

[Updated: August 2017] Lima Lima is one of my favorite tracks from Gustavo Santaolalla’s The Motorcycle Diaries soundtrack. Rather than (his usual) simple playing approach, Lima really displays Santaolalla’s guitar prowess. I had an opportunity to see Gustavo Santaolalla play live in Pittsburgh with his band Bajofondo. […]

[Updated September 2017] Biutiful Biutiful stars Javier Bardem and is directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu (The Revenant, Birdman). Biutiful is a love story between a father and his children. Uxbal (Bardem) is a conflicted man who struggles to reconcile fatherhood, guilt, and mortality amidst the […]

[Updated post and tab: May 2017] The Motorcycle Diaries The Motorcycle Diaries is considered to be one of Gustavo Santaolalla’s greatest film scores. Film synopsis (edited from the official Focus Features site): The Motorcycle Diaries, depicts the rich, complex human and social landscape of early […]

[Updated for 2017] Things We Lost in the Fire, is a 2007 drama starring Halle Berry and Benicio Del Toro: A recent widow (Berry) invites her husband’s troubled best friend (Del Toro) to live with her and her two children. As he gradually turns his […]