Inside the Music with film & TV composer Sam Watts

British composer Sam Watts is an experienced film and TV composer whose music has brought life to popular shows including The Sarah Jane Adventures and Planet Earth II. Ahead of the release of the third season of popular show The Traitors, we caught up with Sam about his musical background, his writing process, his proudest projects, and more.

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Interview with Sam Watts

Sheet Music Direct ("SMD"): Can you tell us a little bit about your musical background and how you got started out in film and TV composition?

Sam Watts ("S"): We had a piano in the house for as long as I can remember, and as soon as I could sort of walk I would climb up at it and just hit it, you know, I liked the noise. And at about five, my mum was so annoyed with me just making horrible noises on the piano that she was like, "Right, we've got to give him lessons." So, I started lessons then. And it was a house that was always full of music. My parents and both of my brothers had very eclectic music tastes. So, I grew up with a very eclectic music taste. And I always loved film and TV. We always used to sit around on a Saturday night and watch Doctor Who together and all of that sort of stuff.

Then when I was at school doing my GCSEs, I had a couple of really good music teachers who encouraged me to write music. And then when I was at university, I'd decided that I wanted to go into film and TV. And Mervyn Cooke, my tutor at university, who is a lovely man and very, very knowledgeable about film and television music—he's written one of the seminal books on the history of film music—had invited George Fenton to come and give us a lecture. And he said to George, "Oh, I've got this kid who's really keen on film and TV music. Would you mind just having a quick chat with him after the lecture?" And luckily George was very, very kind and said yes. I had a lovely chat with him, and then I ended up doing my dissertation on the music for The Blue Planet, and he was very helpful and invited me down to London and gave me a copy of all the scores. Then I badgered him for a job because I'm very, very cheeky, and he gave me a job. I worked for him for three years as his music assistant. And then one day he told me to get lost because we were both far too comfortable with the relationship,and I wouldn't be writing my own music for anyone ever if I stayed. So that's kind of how I started. Then he gave me a call a few months later saying that he had a little TV show that he needed some help with, and that little TV show ended up being Planet Earth. Which was not such a little TV show. So, the first thing I had on TV was my name on the credits of Planet Earth for doing the Diaries section of the show. So, I owe him my career.

SMD: That's fantastic. Very cool story. You mentioned you had an eclectic music taste growing up. Who were your musical inspirations?

S: I liked everything from Guns N' Roses to Stravinsky. The big influences, I think growing up were probably John Williams, Shostakovich, but also the Radiophonic Workshop—people like Mark Ayers and Dominic Glynn and Delia Derbyshire who were making great stuff. Also, Tori Amos. I'm absolutely in love with Tori Amos. Kylie Minogue, who I love. So yeah, really eclectic. And I think lots of different types of music inspired the way I write, not that you necessarily hear it all in my music now. Like, I don't think you'd listen to one of my pieces of music and say, "Oh, Kylie could be singing that." But there's a lot in there that comes from all over the place.

The mind is a muscle, it's just like warming up if you're going to play an instrument. You need to warm up the composition muscle."

SMD: Brilliant. Well that certainly ticks the eclectic box! Can you remember the first piece of music you ever wrote?

S: I can't actually, no. I think my teens was when I really properly started to write. And I used to just blurt rubbish out and write it down, and it was all terrible, which is how everyone starts, you know, other than Mozart. I think most people aren't writing great music the first time they sit down to write music. There's a lot to learn. It's a real craft. A friend of mine, orchestrator Norman Ludwin said to me once something that really kind of blew my mind. He told me he does composition warm ups. So, first thing in the morning, he'll sit down when he's about to write, and he'll just spend 20 minutes and he'll pick an interval, or he'll do something and try and write a just a quick piece, just maybe for piano, or maybe on a clarinet or something that's just using that interval, or a particular scale or whatever. And he said it’s because the mind is a muscle, it's just like warming up if you're going to play an instrument. You need to warm up the composition muscle. And I was like, "Oh, I've never thought of that before. That's a really good idea." So now I try and do little things like that as well to get going. So yeah, you have to learn it all and flex that muscle and teach it how to write. Just like you have to teach your fingers where to fall on a keyboard or on a violin, or whatever.

SMD: That's fascinating. I've never heard that either, but it makes total sense, doesn't it?

S: It's brilliant, isn't it?

SMD: Let's talk a little about The Traitors. You've crafted this dramatic and ominous theme which is perfect for the show. Can you talk about how you went about creating that particular theme?

S: Yeah, it was a funny one. I was asked whether I would be interested in doing the show by a friend of mine called Abi Lambrinos, who is a producer that I've known for a very long time, and it's the first time we've ever worked on the same project. She said, "I've got this show and we need some music, would you be interested?" And I had a meeting, and they asked me to do a show reel pitch. Essentially just put together music that I'd written for other things that might have the right kind of mood for the show. And me being me, I decided to spend a couple of hours on, like, Saturday morning seeing if I could come up with a theme so I could send them a little rough something. They had some pointers of things that they liked, and I sort of tried to marry in some of the aspects of those and work out what they wanted. And that original pitch version of it is a bit slower and not quite as big. But it has the bare bones of everything that's in there now. And then we worked together to turn it into what it became.

But it's one of those things that when people ask you how you came up with something, it's almost impossible to answer because I have no idea how music works. I don't know where it comes from. Like mostly it's me hitting middle C until something appears, you know?! But I think with trying to be driving and moody, but also fun at the same time, led me to a minor key. I knew I wanted a big, bold, almost singable melody. They say the best theme tunes are the ones that you can sing the title of the film or the TV show to. That's not entirely true. And you can't really do it with The Traitors. But yeah, I wanted it to be stupidly large. If you recorded it, you'd need like a 150 piece orchestra. It's just utterly stupid. So it was just trying to get into that mood, and it just eventually came.

When people ask you how you came up with something, it's almost impossible to answer because…I don't know where it comes from. Like mostly it's me hitting middle C until something appears."

SMD: Fantastic. So with the third series of the show coming very shortly, do you have to provide additional musical content for each series to, to fit stuff that's happening?

S: I don't now. I basically made them quite a lot of stuff that they can use. And it goes out with the packet as things they can use when it's licensed in new countries. But quite a lot of the songs you hear are done by other music companies. Bleeding Fingers being one of them, Hans Zimmer's TV arm.

SMD: Now obviously you've worked on lots of lots of projects for TV and beyond. Is there a particular project that you are personally particularly proud of, irrespective of how commercially successful it may have been?

S: That's tough. I'm proud of quite a few of them for different reasons and different projects have different places in my heart, as it were. I'm very proud to have been able to work on The Sarah Jane Adventures, as a Doctor Who fan working on Doctor Who. So that kind of goes for all of my Doctor Who stuff. Tales of the Tardis, all of that stuff just is a joy and I'm very proud of it. I did a series of documentaries with a fantastic filmmaker called Antony Thomas, I did one called For Neda, which was about the 2009 Iranian elections and the fallout of the corruption there and things. It was very difficult as I had five days to write the music! I brought my brother Dan in, and between us we wrote 50 minutes of music in those five days, which is an incredible amount! I'm very proud that we managed to get that finished. And I'm working with a director/actor called Jacob Dudman. And we did a film this year called Untethered, which is about modern-day slavery. Again, a very difficult subject, but I'm very proud of that. It's a really beautiful film.

SMD: Brilliant. And aside from your own work, is there a particular film score or soundtrack that you particularly admire?

S: I've been asked a lot recently what my top five film scores are, and questions like that. And for me, Bernard Herrmann's score to Psycho is a masterclass in not only how to write for picture, but how to write music full stop. It is astoundingly good. The economy of theme of material, the conjuring of emotion and mood, and all done just with a string orchestra. It's absolute genius, it really is. So when my back is in a corner and someone says, what's your favorite film score of all time, the answer is probably Psycho by Bernard Herrmann.

Bernard Herrmann's score to Psycho is a masterclass in not only how to write for picture, but how to write music full stop. It is astoundingly good."

SMD: Great call. And are you a recreational musician yourself? And if so, what music do you like to play if you're not writing music yourself?

S: I practice the piano sometimes when I have time, because I think the better you are at playing the instrument you play, the better you can write, because you're not thinking as much about where your fingers go. You're just kind of doing it. And when I'm doing that I play a lot of Shostakovich, Rachmaninoff, Chopin, show tunes. I love musicals, my not so guilty pleasure! I don't believe in guilty pleasures. So yeah, a lot of the classics. Graham Fitkin, the British composer, I adore his music. I play things like his piano suite of music from The Cone Gatherers all the time. It's just beautiful. So yeah, I try and play the music that I enjoy. I think that's really important when you're practicing, to find the things that will help you progress, but also things that you enjoy playing, because there's nothing worse than, no offense to Scarlatti, but playing your 57th piece of Scarlatti from a grade book. So yeah, just playing the stuff that you enjoy I think.

SMD: And if you could take on any sort of dream project, is there anything you'd love to do?

S: The kind of sappy answer is honestly that I just like working with nice people. So as long as I'm working with nice people, I don't care what the project is. But the real answer is, "Russell, give me Doctor Who, please!" Yeah, I would love to do Doctor Who proper, that has been a dream ever since I started doing it. Or I think a Marvel TV show or a Marvel film would be a lot of fun to have a crack at. High pressure, and I'm not sure I want that stress really, but I would love to have a crack at one of those, or a big animation like How to Train your Dragon. Not that I can get anywhere close to the brilliance of John Powell, but that sort of thing would also be fun.

SMD: And what are you working on next that we can look forward to?

S: Well, I'm actually not at the moment. I'm doing some library stuff and I have a lot of fingers in a lot of pies at the moment in starting things out. But I don't actually have another project, which is not a thing that I love. I like to have my next project in. I'm currently trying to find something to do next. The industry can be quite feast or famine. I have found through my career that I either have too many people asking me to do too many things, or not enough people asking me to do anything at all! One of the downsides, I think, when you have a show like The Traitors, which is amazing and everywhere, people make the assumption that you're too busy to do anything else. Which is a thing I've found when I've been on really anything that's been very successful, especially if it's long-running. It can be hard to convince people that it's okay to approach you to offer more work.

The industry can be quite feast or famine. I have found through my career that I either have too many people asking me to do too many things, or not enough people asking me to do anything at all!"

SMD: Well this is a good note for our blog - Sam Watts is not too busy!

S:He is never too busy. I might say no if I can't fit it in, but I'm never too busy!

SMD: And last question - do you have any advice for up-and-coming composers aspiring to work in the world of film and TV?

S:The first bit of advice is don't use terms like "aspiring" or "up-and-coming." That's not to you. That's to them. Because, are you a composer, or are you not? You have to own what you do. Say "I'm a composer." Okay, your credit list may be zero, or just three short student films, or whatever. But if you use terms like "up-and-coming" or "aspiring," people are instantly going to drop their evaluation of how capable you are. So, if you go into a meeting or if you're at an event or a festival or something and you meet someone that you'd like to work with, don't aspire to be the thing that you already are. Be the thing that you already are. That's probably the first one. And the second one is just be nice. This was a piece of advice that George Fenton gave me, which has worked out very well. He said, "Be nice, because you never know who you meet on the way up that you will need on the way down." Everybody wants to work with the people who are fun to work with, who are nice, who are a pleasure to work with. Nobody wants to work with the person who's difficult, or rude, or has a big ego.

SMD: I think that's good advice in all walks of life, right?

S:Yes, indeed. I think so.

SMD: Brilliant. Well, thank you very much for the time, Sam.

S:No problem, thank you.

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