This is Emmy Award-winning composer and music producer Tyler Strickland. Tyler is coming off of three big-name projects, including the hit docuseries Sly, which first premiered at TIFF and is now streaming on Netflix.
The documentary centers on the lifelong journey of Sylvester Stallone. Tyler contributed to the project by embedding action-highlighting melodies to influence the story and feel, and using American rock influences to heighten the audience’s adrenaline and leave viewers on the edge of their seat.
Additionally, Tyler has recently partnered with Warner Brothers on HBO’s Class 57: Navajo Police, a three-part documentary which first premiered October 17th. Tyler celebrated the release of his original album for the docu-series, which can be found here. The series features the 57th task force of the Navajo Police as they go through their class training. Tyler employed a slight use of a militaristic soundscape, adding snare drums to the score to balance the traditional native-leaning sounds with a nod to the intensity and pressure of the police force. The score is heavily made up of live string quartet, mixed with organic instruments along with some Navajo percussion, which was performed by local musicians on the reservation. Tyler also co-wrote the main theme with Native American composer Michael Begay, who lives on the Navajo reservation.
Tyler is also celebrating the recent debut of Thriller, a documentary commemorating the 40th Anniversary of Michael Jackson’s album of the same name. Each project Tyler has worked on has allowed his nuanced approach to shine through. Whether it’s haunting, chilling, Olympic, or electrifying– his passion is felt in each soundtrack.
Can you share more about your approach to embedding action-highlighting melodies in the Sly documentary to influence the story and feel?
Scoring Sly was such a treat because I grew up with all of his films. There were so many scenes in the documentary where we just let long scenes from the classic movies play out but they needed underscore to move it along, so it was almost like scoring scenes in Rocky and other films that didn’t originally have a score. The action montages with The Expendables and scenes with Arnold really were fun to write some action music for; that’s kind of a rare thing to hear in a documentary score.
How did you balance American rock influences to heighten the audience’s adrenaline in Sly while maintaining the overall narrative?
It’s no secret that rock and roll and Sylvester Stallone kind of go hand in hand. He just has such a grit to him that was begging for distorted electric guitar so we used a lot of that in the music. Our director Thom Zimny is also a rock music aficionado, if you will, so we had a lot of discussions early where we were referencing the emotion from a lot of bands and songs of the classic rock era. All of that definitely influenced the score, but I tried to keep it subtle and always lead with emotion. Distortion was a major thematic element in the score woven throughout his discussions of his childhood.
In Class 57: Navajo Police, you incorporated a militaristic soundscape. What inspired this choice, and how did you strike a balance with traditional native-leaning sounds?
This series was all about the police academy in the Navajo Nation, and I really wanted that militaristic sound to come through in a valiant way. It is subtle, but we blended traditional Navajo percussion and a traditional snare drum to achieve the sound.
The use of live string quartet, organic instruments, and Navajo percussion in Class 57 is intriguing. Could you elaborate on your creative process in blending these elements?
The cadets in this show have so much heart and drive to achieve becoming police and to keep their community safe, which also happens to be largely composed of their families and friends. So we wanted to use a smaller string ensemble to achieve an emotional sound, but with heroic melodies. I love the lighter sound of a quartet because it tends to feel a little more raw and honest. We also wove throughout the score some native percussion. The entire score is recorded live with organic and acoustic instruments to feel as live and human as possible.
Collaborating with Native American composer Michael Begay on the main theme for Class 57 is noteworthy. How did this collaboration enhance the authenticity of the score?
It was wonderful working with Michael on the main title theme for the show. He is living and working on the reservation as a composer and had access to some incredible authentic native American percussion instruments that he performed in the score and we used throughout the show as well. It was such a treat to work with him.
Your recent debut of Thriller commemorates the 40th Anniversary of Michael Jackson’s album. How did you approach creating a soundtrack for a documentary about such an iconic piece of music history?
Scoring Thriller 40 was certainly a daunting task because I was asked to weave original score throughout nonstop iconic pop music in a way that felt seamless, but once I landed on an instrumentation for the score that was entirely 80’s synth sounds, it came together naturally. I simply used a lot of the same sounds they used on the album, but scored the documentary just as I normally would. The tricky part was sticking to that instrumentation. This is definitely a project I’m most proud of in my career as a musician.
Each of your projects seems to have a distinct and nuanced approach. How do you adapt your musical style to fit the unique themes and stories of different documentaries?
I think there might be two different kinds of film composers. Some that have a bit more of a singular and very unique musical approach to scores who often get approached to write scores similar to things they’ve written in the past, and then some that are a bit more of a swiss army knife that are open to variety. It’s challenging to write a variety of different styles of music, but I do think I might be in the latter group. I really enjoy approaching each score as a blank slate and running with the vision of the director. If it’s way outside of my scope sometimes I have to pass on the project, but if it’s something I know I can do well but I just haven’t done it before; I’m most likely going to take the project on.
Can you discuss the challenges you faced in creating a soundtrack for a documentary like Sly, which revolves around the lifelong journey of Sylvester Stallone?
Writing the score for Sly had its challenging moments because of what we knew a lot of the audience tuning in was going to want for this film. We didn’t set out to make a surface level action hero documentary, this is a deep emotional dive into his life and what drove him to become this iconic figure. So I would say the biggest challenge in writing this score was finding the balance of emotional music for the heavy moments without slowing down the film, and finding spots throughout to punch in a burst of energy here and there.
What upcoming projects are you excited about, and how do you envision pushing the boundaries of your musical creativity in future endeavors?
I have a two-part series on Selena Quintanilla coming out at the end of February on Peacock, and some upcoming HBO documentaries that are very exciting. At the moment, I am also working on writing an album of music of my own. It’s something I started years ago and lost touch with, but I’m finally finding time to prioritize it again and it’s very exciting.
Email:neill@outloudculture.com
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