We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Mikel Hurwitz a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Mikel, thanks for joining us today. How did you learn to do what you do? Knowing what you know now, what could you have done to speed up your learning process? What skills do you think were most essential? What obstacles stood in the way of learning more?

Music as in all art forms has elements of artistry and elements of craft. Speaking specifically of the craft though: I believe it simply comes down to putting in the hours. You let it become your identity and realize on the deepest level possible that there is an infinite amount of information to learn and refine: It’s lifetimes of learning. You become humble to those who have come before you, learn from the masters, be patient with yourself and learn the rules so you can break them: All the cliches are cliches for a reason. Prioritize your education, whether formal or from YouTube University!

I wish I’d have learned to read music better earlier in life, that would have sped me up! But more generally: I think when you take risks and put yourself in situations that you aren’t totally sure if you can deliver on or not, you grow quickly and live up to the challenge. Take more risks and have more fun.

In music, the most essential skill aside from playing an instrument is transcribing existing work. It internalizes it within you like nothing else. I suppose it would be the same if an architect would draw sketches of an existing building in a sketchbook, or a mathematician wanting to arrive at an answer without knowing the proof.

In terms of obstacles standing in your way of learning more, there are only ever two, as for anything in life: Yourself & Time. Everything else is just details.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

My name is Mikel Hurwitz and I am a composer, mostly for visual media and sometimes just for the ears.

As we often do as young kids, music is introduced into our lives. I started piano lessons when I was six, quit in a pubescent hormone rage when I was 13, commandeered my dad‘s electric guitar when I was 14 and got deep into grunge, 60s rock and R&B, then got back into piano, but instead of reading, I became obsessed with improvised music.

When I was 15 years old, I got invited to orchestral recording session for a film composer in Toronto and I remember that being one of those turning point moments. I thought: Wait, you can do this for your life?!

Fast-forward many years later and I’ve composed scores for 36 feature films, a handful of short films and worked on the music team for a major Hollywood composer.

Part of the job as a film composer is being able to write music in different genres and evoke different moods. You are a huge part of the creative result of a film and what that means in practice is that you are a creative problem solver. “Try moving this note one second later and see how it feels”, “this mood isn’t quite right, can you try this”, etc

My whole approach is knowing that music is an evolving organism that evolves with the arcs of the story. My brand is always that music should serve the film first but also be able to stand on its own without visual that it is evocative. That’s the goal, at least.

Making music for film, TV, stage, or games is by nature collaborative and it’s so important for me to work with good people. You are always working on crazy deadlines so you end up really being in the trenches with the people you work with – you have to have their back and they have to have yours.

But with all respect to the career and job aspects of writing music, there is a deeper aspect to it: the Art of it.

Art is hard. You have to make a lot of garbage before you can do anything good, and even then sometimes the muse just isn’t there on some days. You have to endure. You have to show up and put in the work.

And above all that, life is short and we have to make things that we can be proud of while we’re here.
It’s for that reason that I’m committed in having the best production value that I can with my music.

Do you think there is something that non-creatives might struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can shed some light?

The thing that I don’t think non-creatives might not be aware of is that procrastination can be part of the creative process. From the perspective of the creative: ‘You have to imagine what something will be or will sound like, before you can make it exist in the world. And as a music creator I can attest to this: If I have a clear concept of what I’m doing before I sit to play the piano or produce a track/song/cue, it will be a much better result.

And more in terms of the overall journey as a creative, it’s a risk that your career will work out. It’s all a massive gamble. It’s good to be a utilitarian in music because you become marketable, however if it is in opposition to your artistic development (and that it’s important to you), don’t be afraid of working a day-job. At all.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

A year after I’d moved to Los Angeles, I got a dream job working as Danny Elfman’s assistant. I learned a tremendous amount – he is a genius. I consider it the best PhD in film scoring I can imagine.

Then I realized there was an expiration date to the job because I needed to be creating my music rather than serving someone else’s. So, I decided to take the leap: I trained my replacement, had the good fortune of landing my first paying feature and then the pandemic happened! It was surreal I got a 2nd and 3rd film, then there was a lull, then it started to come back and I was scoring movies in headphones, in my living room, with a toddler.

I took an educated gamble on myself and its paid off so far. I feel deeply fortunate.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.mikelhurwitz.com
• Instagram: @mikelhurwitz
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikelhurwitz
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@mikelhurwitz
• Other: ReelCrafter
  https://play.reelcrafter.com/6892263c-61c2-4929-956e-869b69e94954?_DO_NOT_SHARE_THIS_LINK&published=1

Image Credits

Chris Blow 2023 (headshots)
Don Teva (Orchestral)
Irina Bazik