Auditorium Theatre 2019-20 Issue 1 Get Out

8 | AUDITORIUM THEATRE 2019-20 | September 21 - November 16, 2019 On September 21, the Auditorium Theatre partners with the Chicago Sinfonietta to present the live concert experience of Jordan Peele’s Academy Award-winning film Get Out . Michael Abels, the composer of the film's score, conducts the Sinfonietta in this one-night-only event. Abels was kind enough to take the time to chat with the Auditorium about his life, his career, and what it was like to score Get Out . To hear the full interview with Abels, check out the Auditorium’s podcast, #AudTalk, at theaud.us/audtalk. Auditorium Theatre [AUD]: When did you first become interested in music? Michael Abels [MA]: I feel like music has always been a part of me. I remember hearing music even before I could walk. I loved music that was happy and music that was about scary things, I was always naturally drawn to it. I bugged my grandmother and made her find me piano lessons at age 4. AUD: When did you start composing music as opposed to just playing it? MA: I have a brain that’s fascinated by puzzles, and to me, composing music seemed like a puzzle. By 13, I finished a piece of music and I was hooked after that — I solved the puzzle! AUD: Let’s talk about Get Out . It was your first film score — Jordan Peele saw a video of your piece “Urban Legends” on YouTube and called you up. I can see why the connection would be made between that piece and a film score for something like Get Out , so I’m curious about that piece and how it led to Mr. Peele calling you. MA: I’ve always looked at music as storytelling, and I’ve always been interested in scoring films. In school I had scored student films and things like that, but had never gotten much traction doing it. A couple of my concert pieces were online, and they had a few dozen hits. It turned out that one of those hits was Jordan Peele. Jordan was already known for Key and Peele , but what no one knew about him at the time was that he was a future auteur! He’s seen every horror film, he knows their scores, has a very keen sense of what makes the music work. He was looking for music that depicts emotion, the extremes of human emotion and the human condition very effectively. He was looking for someone who both had that musical language in them and wasn’t afraid of it, and who also really could “get” the experience of the lead character of Get Out, who’s a young African American male living in a white society, dating a white girl, going upstate to meet her parents. I think he heard in my music that I might be the person who could do that. AUD: How did you work with Mr. Peele to score the film? MA: Jordan said that he wanted the African American voice to be a part of this score both literally and metaphorically. African American music is kind of infused with hope, even the blues. He said, “You have to drain the hope right out of it.” [ laughs ] The bottom line of the music is that it’s scarier than s*#t! I said, I think what you’re talking about is “gospel horror.” So that was the catchphrase. I went away and wrote him a couple of demos. One of those was the tune that ended up becoming the main title, “Sikiliza Kwa Wahenga.” AUD: What can you tell us about that piece? MA: That’s my version of realizing the words “gospel horror” and putting it into music. It’s got a black choir, so you hear African American voices, and they’re representing the souls of the departed, slaves and lynching victims and others. They’re trying to warn the movie’s main character, Chris, very literally to “get out,” but ghosts always speak to us in shadow and dreams and metaphor — they can’t just sing the phrase! An Interview with Get Out Composer Michael Abels Michael Abels