Composer
Website: karatalve.com
Contact: Megan Campbell,
Most recent: Faraway Downs
Composer Kara Talve began to learn her craft at Boston’s Berklee College of Music before moving to L.A. to work her way through internships. Those included one at music label Sparks & Shadows, and another at composers collective Bleeding Fingers Music, where she honed her writing skills, gleaned her first opportunities, and where she still works today. From renowned animated comedy sitcom The Simpsons to BBC nature docuseries Prehistoric Planet, Talve has applied her versatile composing skills to a range of projects, most recently working on the Baz Luhrmann-directed Faraway Downs, in which Talve creates a musical backdrop to the Australian outback in this adventure miniseries starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman.
“At this point in my career, I’m happy to work on anything. My boss is Russell Emanuel, and his business partner is Hans Zimmer. They know our musical language and know who’s going to work well on what project. My favorite that I’ve worked on was Faraway Downs, because this was the show that helped me showcase my musical voice,” Talve says. “This project had an epic orchestral score that had notes of the 1940s, Old Hollywood sound. It wasn’t until I started working on this project that I found my musical identity.”
Talve has been most recently working on music for The Tattooist of Auschwitz, premiering in May. Talve co-scored the series with Hans Zimmer.
“The biggest thing I’ve learned along the way as a composer has almost nothing to do with music itself, and that’s the importance of being a good collaborator who is willing to put in the time that this type of job requires,” Talve says. “It’s not 9 to 5; it becomes your entire life, and you need to be willing to say yes if you want to be successful. You need to know how to listen to the directors and not be attached to your music.”
