Babylon mixes up a lot of influences, he tells Deadline.
It has some jazz influences, rock n roll, and contemporary dance music in the music.
DEADLINE: How would you say your working relationship with Damien has changed throughout the years?
Margot Robbie inBabylon.Paramount Pictures/Everett Collection
That being said, its never been an easy process, and its still not.
No, no, before I finally get the, Ah, thats the one.
Thats really the keeper.
So, its got a little more efficient.
It was about a three-year project for me in total of working on it.
DEADLINE: Do you both keep track of each others musical tastes throughout the years?
HURWITZ:No, not really.
I love pop music.
Theyre usually not literal models.
For example, in the case ofFirst Man, he sent me a lot of 90s grunge music.
Likewise, the music he sent me forBabylonwasnt really 1920s jazz or 1920s music.
DEADLINE: You and Damien have worked on many different jazz iterations in your filmographies together.
HURWITZ:No, I have no jazz background.
People assume that Im a jazz person, and its not where I come from at all.
It was really through Damiens movies that Ive developed the grammar for jazz.
And its a certain kind of jazz; its a very kind of tonal jazz.
I would say its sort of like, we combine many more genres and styles in this score.
AndBabylonmixes up a lot of other influences.
Theres a lot of contemporary dance music in the music.
Theres just a lot of flavors we draw from.
Theres a lot of Middle Eastern flavors and Latin flavors.
There were orchestral cues.
There are a lot of circus sounds in the score.
Were really kind of putting a lot of different things in a blender to create the world ofBabylon.
DEADLINE: What did your orchestral setup look like for Babylon?
How many instruments are we talking about here?
HURWITZ:The orchestral cues were a 98-piece orchestra.
So, we had a group of African percussionists come in and add a lot of layers.
We had a group of Latin percussionists come in and add a lot of layers.
It would sound like the feeling of band members kind of vocalizing in the middle of songs.
So, that was one sort of inspiration.
So, there were a lot of influences and a lot of layers.
DEADLINE: Everyone has a different creative process; what helps you visualize the music before you create it?
Also, what do you keep in mind while scoring?
HURWITZ:I do think very narratively about our scores.
InBabylon, for example, we seed pretty much all of the melodies at that first party.
And then we sometimes bring those melodies back in very disguised ways to score different scenes of the movie.
Its these sort of male droning vocals that have this sort of Gregorian chant quality to them.
So, were calling back basically one of the main pieces of music from that first party.
And here were way off on this other storyline, and theres all this danger.
But Nellies kind of the stakes here.
If this plan doesnt work with the money and all this, Nellies going to be totally screwed.
So, I love those narrative connections, and I love to score that way.
I mean, the music has to be a story, really.
When did you start taking yourself more seriously as an artist?
So, I already had a sense of what I wanted to do at that point.
But it was really in college that I think I developed the kind of work ethic I have now.
We became actual roommates sophomore year.
And he was always working on screenplays, and I was always working on my music.
Damiens made a lot of movies about the sacrifices it takes when youre really passionate about what you do.
DEADLINE: Which character was easier or harder to create music for?
How did you manage crafting their personalities in the music as well?
Whereas the Manny and Nellie theme was the most challenging to narrow in on.
And where we ended up was, its the sound of three pianos blended together.
One of the pianos is just a very sort of pretty-sounding Steinway mid-size grand.
And then the piano is also de-tuned a fair amount, so its a little bit out of tune.
And then the third piano is a very, very out of tune and broken upright.
And it created this sort of fragile, broken quality that just felt like their relationship.
And then on top of it, we add some circus sounds.
Can you talk about what went into making that montage music?
Its the only track in the score where things get truly electronic for a second.
Its a huge wall of sound and a very intentionally messy piece of music.
And theyre all staggered in a way that theyre all coming to the forefront at their own moment.
