In a world full of indie game developments, feature films, and podcasts, there are rare occasions when the Wavyrn studio gets to dabble in other artistic mediums. But one short film happened to involve a rather fun twist: a musical theatre number!

Broadway Blues is a student animated short film about a performer that has fallen out of love with performance. His sister helps to rekindle his spirit… through song! “Live Like It’s a Dream”, written by Marc Yu and Adam Blotner, is the song that scores this film as the characters sing and dance their way through a dream sequence. Given how special the opportunity was, of course the studio decided to get a full cast recording with a big band!

It has been almost a year since we crammed twenty-three people, instrumentalists and recording engineers and Wavyrn production members alike, into a studio at Boston’s The Record Co for the orchestral recording session. It made the other two recording sessions for this project (with the rhythm section and vocalists, respectively) much less daunting in scope, but it was still one of the biggest projects we had put on yet!

Q: What was your role on the project? What did you do?

Marc: I was the composer and music supervisor. I worked on scoring the underscore, as well as arranging and orchestrating the musical number.

Angelica: I was the composer’s assistant! I revised and copied the parts for the recording sessions, and I acted as the booth reader for all of those sessions as well.

Q: Have you worked on similar projects before? What is your experience with musical theater?

Marc: I’ve worked on musical theater-related projects informally before, but this short film was so different. I’ve always been a big fan of musicals—some of my favorites are La La Land, Les Misérables, Hamilton, and The Phantom of The Opera. But this was my first time composing musical theater for an animated project.

Angelica: Musical theatre is my wheelhouse, so I was thrilled to be put on this project! I’ve been a composer-lyricist and music director on multiple musicals before, but none of them were for film.

Q: What made this project different or similar from other projects you’ve worked on?

Marc: First, we had demo recording sessions with the vocalists so that the short film could be animated and synced to the song. We also recorded videos of the jazz trio so that they could be animated as well. After we received the animation, we made tweaks to the song and finally had our recording sessions. We recorded the jazz band, and then we had our musical director, Jack Richman, work with and conduct our ensemble, as well as vocalists.

Angelica: I realized how much I enjoy the process of copying and score prepping music, as I usually work on more aspects of the compositional process outside of the studio. It was nice to be able to learn how to prep for such a large recording session (making everyone specified binders was a blast)! I don’t record many personal projects live, so going to a twenty-piece ensemble in a studio was huge.

Q: What was it like being at the recording session?

Marc: It was awesome! In my field of screen scoring and audio production, it’s always such a thrill to see everything come together. I had really talented people working with me and bringing the project to life. Dong Yao Liu was our recording engineer. Jack Richman is experienced in musical theater and knows what they’re doing—they conducted the ensemble and worked with our vocalists in a way that I couldn’t have. I think it was a thrill for everyone.

Angelica: This was my first professional recording session outside of academia! Usually I am the one being recorded, as I am an instrumentalist, so this was also my first time inside the booth for a session. My adrenaline was kicking in from typing the barrage of take notes being spouted around the room, it was great fun.

Q: Was there anything difficult or challenging about this project?

Marc: It was difficult arranging the music initially because I was not working directly with the songwriter who initially drafted the song. Without a direct line of communication, the director and I made a lot of guesses about the intention of certain things in the song, like the harmony and melody. The director has a certain style in mind as well, so I had to do my best to mold it. It took a lot of listening to references and many slight tweaks to the original song in order to get it just right.

Angelica: Definitely the fact that we were not in direct communication with the songwriter! To fit the director’s vision, we have to make substantial edits when orchestrating for our ensemble. The sheer scope was also challenging, as we had to plan and execute three recording sessions in a month, with a very quick turnaround afterwards.

Q: What was your favorite part about the project/recording session?

Marc: The joy in the room! You can really see it on everyone’s faces. The recording engineer, the conductor, myself and Angelica, the players…when we finished recording, we knew that we did something awesome.

Angelica: Finally working on something musical theatre related at Wavyrn!