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Our experience of watching a film is as much shaped by the music as the words and images. The music creates an atmosphere, adds a special magical element to lift a scene, illuminates aspects of the story and cements our memories of the film as a whole.

Presenter Tommy Pearson is steeped in this subject and in ‘Global Beats’ he talks to a variety of composers and commentators from around the world about this form of musical storytelling.

We hear about the intense collaboration between the composer and the film’s director.The film adaptation of the famous Nigerian novel ‘Half of A Yellow Sun’ created a close working relationship between Nigerian director/screen writer, Biyi Bandele and composer Ben Onono. We hear them discuss how the music accentuated the storytelling.

We also learn how the writer/director of the Iranian film, ‘The President’ was inspired to write his film after hearing music written by Indian composer, Tajdar Junaid. That music became a guiding narrative for the film. Also, the first woman to win an oscar for her film music, British composer Rachel Portman, reveals how she went about devising original music that would complement the period style of the adaptation of Jane Austen’s ‘Emma’.

(Photo: Tajdar Junaid. Credit: Ramanuj Das)