Before rescoring the scene from ‘Persona’, I thought it’d be a good idea to watch the original a few times and look out for aspects of the score that make it work well:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8TJ2d7-1e8

The original score was composed by Lars Johan Werle, and I’d say it’s more of a collage of different soundscapes coming one after another than a particularly linear piece which I find interesting as I have never really composed anything that cuts so quickly between different ideas. There are elements of musique concrète interspersed with a haunting string section that comes in and out of the piece. I particularly like the build-up of strings right at the end, they are a good way of introducing tension. The audience doesn’t yet know who the faces on the screen are, but I feel like the soundtrack does a good job of suggesting that there is something sinister afoot, and as we learn later on the image of their faces merging reflects the plot of the film towards the end.

I also enjoyed the sound of the projector near the beginning being constantly interrupted by strange sounds that sound almost like car horns – I’m not entirely sure why but it felt very disorientating. The sudden cut to a completely different section when the stop motion film comes in is also rather effective, and I think that the percussion makes the clip seem rather gimmicky, in a way.

Overall, I find the score to be a really strong piece of composition, and when looking to find elements that I didn’t particularly enjoy I really couldn’t find anything to fault with it. I think it’s going to be a challenge to rescore this scene and produce something that I feel holds up against the original, however I’m still excited to work with this clip and perhaps produce a score that’s more relevant to today’s sonic climate.

When I was trying to research Werle’s process, I couldn’t find much about this film which is a shame as I wanted to learn more about he made it, and what certain sounds were. However, I did come across the fact that this was one of only three films he ever scored, which I find really impressive considering just how good this score is – It’s also a shame he didn’t compose for more films. I had never heard of Werle before starting this project, and I think I will watch the other two films (‘Hour of the Wolf’ and ‘The Island’) that he scored when I have some free time, as I would like to compare them to his work on ‘Persona’.