Clausen on Writing Simpsons Music
Of most TV shows, the Simpsons can boast of having one of the most memorable musical intros. The show has been on the air for so long, it’s easy to understand how that might have happened. Yet, there’s more to the music of the show then just the intro. As Wayne Bledsoe points out in Knoxnews.com:
Clausen is a little frustrated that Danny Elfman sometimes gets credit for creating the music for the television show “The Simpsons.”
“Danny was there for one day,” says Clausen. “I’ve been there for 17 years.”
Elfman composed “The Simpsons’” main theme, but it is Clausen who writes the music for each episode, including writing music for all the songs on the new album “Testify,” the third release of original music from “The Simpsons.”
Of course, The Show has had lots of memorable songs — Mr. Burn’s “See My vest” immediately comes to mind. That’s why, the forthcoming CD is going to be great. Basically, it’s likely to be a “greatest hits.”
As for Clausen’s song writing process, Bledsoe quotes him as:
“The songs always originate from lyrics in the script,” says Clausen. “The original scriptwriter will come up with the first draft of the lyric, which, hopefully, will carry the story ahead. And once the script is turned in to our group of writers, they’ll probably do six drafts of the script before it’s released. Then I get a copy of the lyrics they’ve come up with and I compose the song to the lyrics, record a demo of the song with a small instrumental group and studio singers, so everybody knows how the song is supposed to go. We’ll record the cast voices on that track and make a composite mix of that and send it to the animators, and the animators animate to that track. Then it will come back to me about six or eight months later. I will then throw away that small rhythm section track and replace it with a full orchestra. And that will happen about two weeks before air time.”
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