A rare interview with Film Composer Mark Blackledge in his writing & recording studios

Doris Shades spends the weekend with composer and orchestra conductor Mark Blackledge and his

wife Maryam. Then on Sunday morning she manages to get a very rare interview with Mark in his writing & recording studios.

They talk about music composition for film, TV and Shades Of Bad as they have now done three feature films together as well as the web TV series and travel show spin off.

Actress Jean Heard has known Mark for 20 years, he has composed the music for the INDYUK films she has co produced, Freight with ICON, Bula Quo with Universal and Devil's Gate which was signed to an American company that went into bankruptcy, (which now they have back and hope to put on Amazon).

The music from Shades Of Bad helps lift the web TV show to a level way above the current web TV show, maybe other web TV shows do not consider music and sound enough. Mark's sound design in episode 13 was quite brilliant. He plays the music and breaks it down talking about the key changes and moods he produces.

Mark has now supplied Jean with a library of music cues that she lays on after each edit, but up to about episode 30 Mark did the complete sound design as well as composition.

Mark has also done other major films and TV from Nativity to many US cartoon shows some which he was never allowed to take the credit for, but that is the business and it now affords him to pick and choose what he does, sitting at the grand piano in his recording studio space which could house a mini orchestras or a large band comfortably, or on his mixing suit with screen projection on the wall opposite his desk which he also uses to remotely watch the musicians he mixes.

This is a very rare and unusual insight into film composition and Mark's methods. Good post production means better pictures.

If you want to hear more of Mark's music, the longer music cues from Shades Of Bad are cut to the shots of the Botanical Gardens in St Lucia, which you can see by clicking here.

Freight is now a very hard hitting novel that goes further than the movie did.