January 10, 2020
BBC’s DRACULA Soundtrack by David Arnold & Michael Price Released by Silva Screen – Digital Available Now, CD Due Jan 31st
Composers David Arnold and Michael Price have reunited with the writers and creators Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss of BBC’s SHERLOCK to breathe musical life into another famous literary character from Victorian times. Silva Screen Records has digitally released the DRACULA soundtrack today; a CD edition will be available on January 31st.
For DRACULA, Arnold and Price conceived an innovative and petrifying score, in which traditional instruments and musique concrète merge with contemporary use of samples and sound design. Scoring DRACULA presented its own challenges and the composers have augmented the sound of the orchestra players by creating a library of sounds used throughout the score.
At the launch of the series at the BFI Southbank, David Arnold said “We created a bunch of quite awful sounds that were musical, one of which was actual real blood in a glass, with the finger run round the top of the rim… We created percussion things with coffins. The best thing was, I got the sound department to send me all their recordings of screaming babies, and I made an organ out of screaming babies.”
Also featured on the score are Cello soloists Tim Gill (London Sinfonietta Principal) and Caroline Dale (TRULY, MADLY, DEEPLY, HILARY AND JACKIE) and Electric Cello from Peter Gregson. The atmospheric music is perfectly complemented by the classical soprano Grace Davidson and jazz singer Sumudu Jayatilaka.
The three 90-minute episodes premiered on January 1st, 2nd and 3rd, at BBC 1. The series is shown on Netflix outside of the UK and Ireland.
See our earlier story for more details and to watch the series trailer, here.
