27 years of industry experience! - The Professional Composer’s Guide

Award-winning composer and now author Paul Thomson and in-house composer Dan Keen sit down to talk about Paul's new eBook -The Professional Composer’s Guide.

The perfect comprehensive guide for anyone who is interested in becoming a professional composer, or anyone who would like to refine or develop their technical and creative skills when writing music.

[OfficialStevenCravis]

At first I hesitated regarding the price, but just the organization, database ideas, industry pricing charts alone are worth even more, now that I’ve seen more what’s in it after purchasing. Congratulations, and thank you, Paul Thomson!

[KerwinYoungComposer]

I wish this book could be available as a hardcover purchase to have it up on the bookshelf or sitting on the desk.

[pinkowitzmusic]

Fantastic interview! Already loving the book. Great to read your perspective!

[saraaloy]

Looking forward to read it but, How teachers can get the discount? I don't see any information on the site. Thanks

[westheartmusic]

The mark of a good soul is someone who wants to help others become better - I’m sure this book will be a valuable read to anyone looking to get into media composition. I wish I’d got into this 30 years ago - but still as passionate about writing music now as I’ve ever been and a lot of that is thanks to Spitfire Audio - thanks guys 🙏🏻

[dustinlaumusic]

Amazing. I'd love to hear this in audio book some day with Paul narrating.

[balamjs]

Please make your new VSTi a multitrack. That's what we need now. You have worked beautifully on samples, now you should look after your VSTi player.

[towenaar]

Instant buy. I've become such a huge fan of Paul's Youtube channel as a source of endless knowledge. Thanks team

[skiperickson]

Fantastic interview. Question: will this ever be sold as a PDF, as opposed to having to utilize the eBook reader? Just curious before I purchase.

[MamaSymphonia]

Are there any plans to record a dry studio orchestral percussion library for Kontakt to complement the Studio Orchestra range? The percussion in Bernard Herrmann recorded in that space is so amazing but it lacks a few important colors (solo mallets and bells, mark tree, etc). I'd buy it right away if you ever made one :)

[nealfiggy]

I’ll wait for the physical copy. I hate reading on a screen and I want to write notes in the margins.

[MichaelDowComposer]

This is a great idea, and muchly appreciated by many thousands of us early career composers. Thank you

[maryshaw]

Loving the book Paul, congrats! Quick question - would it be possible to get a sample of your cue spreadsheet or something similar in Google Docs? The screenshot in the Issu app is impossible to read. Thanks in advance!

[cornerliston]

Lovely.
Although I do have to say the pricing strategy on this one is a bit odd, considering it's an e-book—compared with a very rich illustrated four colour printed hardcover book.

[skelligringphotographyandw]

I really want(ed) to buy this book, but the price is out of my reach. I suspect that only those professional composers who are making a good living from the work, could afford it. The problem is...they don't need it! Paul, have you considered that it might be possible to sell more books at a lower price than a few books at a high price?

[gregoryivesdolbyatmosmusic]

I"m sure this will be valuable for folks..

[diogogoncalves]

I would guess that it's a book with an exquisid bookbinding and cover, with paul's orchestration techniques!

[markrobinson]

key statement " you have a window of opportunity".... be setup and prepared The musical inspiration visits but quickly... capture is the essence (I think he talks about this 19 minutes in) 
ON Vangelis:
He explains his customary method of approach. As soon as the musical idea is there, as many keyboards as possible are connected to the control-desk, which in turn are directly connected to the applicable tracks of the multi-track machine. The idea now is to play as many keyboards as possible at the same time. That way, as broad a basis as possible develops, which only needs fine-tuning. After that it's a question of adding things or leaving out things

[studieslessonstheoryetc]

Paul’s IMDB, if I’m on the right one, shows the most recent credit being a Roald Dahl tv doc from 2016. Is that accurate?

[Superduperond]

Ensemble patches for bbcso for fast writing 😃😃😃