What makes the Bond musical ‘sound’?

This week Warren Ringham of Q The Music returns to the show to talk about the James Bond sound and his life as a performer dedicated to 007. We discuss the challenge of composing an original Bond-esque song as Warren has just completed his first composition. Along the way we tackle mainstream journalists writing about Bond music; Bond themes as a snapshot of their musical era and embracing the contemporary; melody replaced by rhythm and ambiance in much modern film scoring; Newman’s scores and where to from here with Zimmer; and the atmospheric scoring of Moonraker, Thunderball and From Russia With Love.

We then transition to Warren’s personal story, growing up in a musical family, attending Music college and then 15 years of building the Q the Music tribute band. He notes the particular challenge of arranging the Bond music for his group and his commitment to creating an authentic Bond sound; Q the Music’s little flourishes or takes on some of the Bond themes; the buzz of the live performance; writing and performing a 20 minute medley for the 50th Anniversary event at Piz Gloria; and what might happen if he met his musical hero.

The recording took place in the UK and New Zealand.

Paul Atkinson is a co-founder of MI6-HQ.com and the magazine MI6 Confidential

Warren Ringham is the founder of Q The Music (qthemusicshow.com)

This podcast is copyright Pretitles LLC © 2020

Music credit 'Spy & Die' by Jay Man