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VIDEO GAMES and THE SOUND OF STAR WARS:
Following in the Footsteps of John Williams
SCREENING ROOM
(The Bright Family Screening Room)
10:00am - 10:45am
with Gordy Haab ('Star Wars: Battlefront', Composer and Orchestrator at Electronic Arts), Jesse Harlin (Composer, 'Star Wars: The Old Republic' - Dunderpate Music), Kevin Kiner (Composer, 'Star Wars: Clone Wars', 'Star Wars: Rebels') - Moderated by Steve Schnur (Worldwide Executive, Music, Electronic Arts)
PANEL DESCRIPTION
Join the composers who have continued on the legacy of John Williams and his iconic score for Star Wars in such projects as Star Wars: Battlefront, Star Wars The Old Republic, Star Wars: Rebels, and Star Wars: The Clone Wars.
Steve Schnur (Moderator)
Music Supervisor
Steve has always been in the business of music. He was born outside of New York City and by age 7 he began to study guitar, piano, composition, production and arrangement at Carnegie Hall. By the time he attended college he became a full time intern at MTV in its earliest days where he helped to influence the programming decisions behind the debuts of Madonna and Michael Jackson, amongst many others. He went on to hold various executive positions with Warner Music Group, EMI and BMG, and was behind the debuts of artists ranging from Metallica, to Sarah McLachlan, to Coldplay. Steve also worked for many years in Nashville when he ran the label Arista Austin, which was a part of the Arista Nashville family of labels. There he worked with artists ranging from Brooks and Dunn to Brad Paisley. Steve also produced several records while in Nashville such as Radney Foster’s “See What You Want To See”, which included Keith Urban future hits “Raining On Sunday” and “I’m In”. Additionally, Steve went on to work as music supervisor for Sandra Bullock’s production company, Fortis Films, where he supervised and produced music for the hit comedy MISS CONGENIALITY (which garnered a Golden Globe nomination for best original song).
Steve is currently the Worldwide Executive and President of EA Music Group for Electronic Arts where he has been responsible for the launch of artists ranging from Thirty Seconds to Mars, to Katy Perry, including his own co-production of Florence + the Machine’s “I’m Not Calling You A Liar”. His hands-on approach with composer selection and score production has earned EA well over 50 soundtrack nominations over the last 10 years in which Steve has produced over 200 EA soundtrack albums. With the formation of Artwerk Music Group, through which EA now directly signs, develops and launches artists for publishing, master recordings, sync deals and distribution, Steve, as its President, has signed alternative breakthroughs Matt and Kim, Chromeo, and Ladytron, amongst others.
Steve has been profiled by the New York Times, London Financial Times and CNN. Additionally, he was selected as “One Of The Most Creative People In Entertainment” by Entertainment Weekly, both “One of the Most Powerful People in the Music Business” and “One of the Top 20 Power Players in Digital Entertainment” by Billboard Magazine and “One of The Top 25 Power Players in the new Hollywood” by The Wall Street Journal. In 2009, he was awarded “International Music Person of the Year” at MusExpo’s annual music conference in Hollywood and in 2015 “Music Supervisor of the Year”. On Grammy day in 2012, Steve received the Music Supervisor of the Year Award from the Guild of Music Supervisors.
Kevin Kiner
Honored with multiple Emmy and Annie nominations, Kevin Kiner is one of the most versatile and sought-after composers in Hollywood. In creating music for the wild west, to a galaxy far, far away, Kevin’s wide musical range has allowed him to take on such diverse projects as Disney’s Star Wars: Rebels, AMC’s hit series Hell on Wheels, CW’s Jane the Virgin, CBS’s CSI:Miami, Cartoon Network’s Transformers Robots in Disguise, and Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Most recently, Kevin composed the score for Netflix’s Emmy-winning documentary series Making a Murderer, and has begun working with Sony and Amy Hennig on her widely anticipated Star Wars videogame.
Gordy Haab
Gordy Haab is a multi award-winning film, video game and television composer who has written music for many well-known titles, including most recently: EA and DICE’s “Star Wars: Battlefront”, which won Music of the Year, Best Interactive Score, and Best Instrumental Score at the 2016 GDC G.A.N.G. Awards, and was nominated for a BAFTA for Excellence in Audio Achievement. Haab also recently scored Activision/AMC's "The Walking Dead", based on the #1 hit TV series and Microsoft's "Kinect: Star Wars", which won "Best Music" at the Hollywood Music In Media Awards. Haab continues to compose the music for EA and Bioware’s "Star Wars: The Old Republic," for which he was awarded "Best Original Soundtrack" and "Best Instrumental Music" at the 10th Annual GDC G.A.N.G. Awards.
Haab’s music has received the highest praise from numerous industry publications and many of the world’s leading media outlets, including the Huffington Post, who said, “Star Wars Battlefront is sounding better and better everyday…this new Star Wars music will light your saber”. Hardcore Gamer said, “Star Wars Battlefront features the best game score John Williams never wrote”. And the Los Angeles Times said Haab created “the B-side to John Williams’ score”.
Haab is known for his unsurpassed understanding of the orchestra as well as his unique ability to blend contemporary and traditional sounds into one – often times conceiving and creating brand new musical instruments to feature in his scores. He has recorded and conducted his music with orchestras from all around the world, including The London Symphony Orchestra, The San Francisco Symphony, The Nashville Symphony and the Hollywood Studio Orchestra.
A few of Haab's other film, television and video game credits include: Anchor Bay's "Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon"; MTV's "The Truth Below"; Dave Barry's "Guide to Guys"; Lionsgate's "War"; The Oprah Network’s “The Judds”; Roadside Attractions' "Shrink"; TLC's "Little People Big World"; ABC's "Greek"; NBC's "Kath and Kim"; VH-1's "Scream Queens"; Endeavor's "At the Edge of the World"; LucasArts' "Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings", and many others.
Haab is a graduate of the University of Southern California, where he received his master's in Scoring For Motion Pictures, Television and Other Media. Prior, he received a bachelor's degree in Music Composition at Virginia Commonwealth University. While he learned from many composers in university and conservatory settings, Haab says that most of his music education comes simply from, "Playing in 100's of rock bands and being an avid fan of Hitchcock, Kubrick, Lucas and Spielberg films . . . "B" Horror Movies of the 70's and 80's . . . and all of their great scores."
Jesse Harlin
Jesse's career in interactive audio spans two millennia. He is currently the freelance composer behind DunderpateMusic.com. Before that, he was the staff Composer/Music Supervisor for LucasArts, a Lucasfilm Ltd. company for 10 years. He's written an alien language, fulfilled his childhood dreams of rock stardom, and written space pig folk music (no lie). He also wrote the monthly "Aural Fixation" column for Game Developer Magazine for six years. His credits include games such as Mafia III, Star Wars: The Old Republic, MARVEL’s Avengers Academy, CounterSpy, Star Wars: Republic Commando, and Wartune: Hall of Heroes.