Photo:Marcus Maschwitz
Marcus Maschwitz
Lorne Balfe has enraptured moviegoers once again.
The 47-year-old Grammy-winning composer — known for his scores on films and shows such asMission: Impossible,Top Gun: Maverick,Black WidowandThe Crown—says he “never looks back” at his achievements.
“I still feel that it’s constantly, it’s still happening, so I don’t tend to look back, and I have to say it’s going pretty quickly,” Balfe tells PEOPLE of his accomplished career. “I tend to not think about the past because I think if you do, sometimes you think about how great those projects were. So I tend to live for the moment, especially with writing music.”
Balfe’s most recent accomplishment is scoring the filmArgylle, which features a star-studded cast includingBryce Dallas Howard,Dua LipaandHenry Cavill. Discussing how his compositions in the movie came to be, the Scottish composer says it all began “about three and a half years ago” when he met up withArgylledirector Matthew Vaughn atAbbey Road Studiosin London.
Ethan Gillespie
“We started talking about film, and then we actually started writing the movie’s music together … he’s also a very good musician,” Balfe says. “So we started writing it together, and that was the beginning of the journey, and the journey went down lots of different avenues.”
Obtaining the rights to “Now and Then,” the Beatles song that laid the foundation for the movie, was “an amazing coincidence,” Balfe explains: “Thankfully, Giles Martin, who is the producer of the song, is a school friend of Matthew’s.”
He adds, “So they’ve known each other for a long time, and Matthew was always looking for a song that could be a trigger forElly’s character … something that was representative of her life. And it was just an amazing coincidence that at the same time Giles was working on this song and mentioned it to us. It worked so well that the lyrics are very nostalgic, they’re very reminiscent of love and the past, and it just fit Elly’s path so beautifully. The stars were aligned.”
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Working with big-name producers and filmmakers like Vaughn, 52, and Martin, 54 is “always very intimidating” for Balfe. “The best thing that has happened out of all of this is that when writing all of these songs with Giles andGary [Barlow]and Stuart [Price] and Matthew, we’ve all become friends through this, and that’s just been an amazing experience.”
He continues, “But when you’re with people who have made, personally, I think, some of the best songs ever written, I think you get very intimidated, that’s for sure. But then you have to put that aside and get on with the day job.”
When asked what it takes to be a great composer, Balfe says “That I can’t answer… I don’t know.” He adds: “I think if you want to achieve, you’ve got to have a love and a passion for being able to tell a story and want to tell an audience how to feel. I think I’m still practicing that.”
Balfe’s practice has led to numerous scores, but picking his favorite is “like picking a favorite child,” he says. “I think that each time you move on to another project, you learn something new, you learn a new skill, you learn a new way of trying to tell a story."
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Now thatArgylleis in theaters, Balfe is looking ahead to what’s next: “I’m working onBeverly Hills Cop, the new one, as well asBad Boys, so that’s what I’m doing now, but also getting to work with Matthew on another couple of secret projects, which is always fun.”
While continuing to work on his compositions, Balfe is going to enjoy the journey. “I didn’t realize life was going to go so fast," he says, “but it’s been a fun ride.”
source: people.com
