Composer duo for The Romanoffs discuss Russian influence and other musical inspirations
By Amy Woolsey
How do you create music fit for royalty? Composer duo Giona Ostinelli and Sonya Belousova talk The Romanoffs and the secrets of collaboration.
The Romanoffs is nothing if not ambitious. Created by Mad Men auteur Matthew Weiner, the Amazon series consists of eight self-contained stories about people who claim to be descendants of the Romanov royal family. (It isn’t as outlandish as you might think.) Each episode features a star-studded cast, twisty plotting, and, of course, meticulous aesthetic detail.
Released last Friday, “The House of Special Purpose” lives up to its ominous title. It follows Olivia Rogers (Christina Hendricks), an A-list actress hired to play the lead of a miniseries about the Romanovs after her predecessor mysteriously drops out. As filming progresses, Olivia increasingly struggles with the fickle demands of her director Jacqueline (Isabelle Huppert), and reality veers into horror, Mulholland Drive-style. Frequent David Lynch collaborator Mary Sweeney co-wrote the script with Weiner.
With a nearly 90-minute run time, the episode is a lot to digest, evoking memories of Mad Men’s “The Crash”. In addition to the entrancing performances by Hendricks and Huppert, what holds the whole affair together is the music. Over the years, Giona Ostinelli and Sonya Belousova have developed a close partnership, working together on the Facebook Watch drama Sacred Lies, the 2017 film M.F.A., and a range of other projects. For “The House of Special Purpose”, they wrote a richly layered score whose ephemeral moods mirror those of the episode.
Culturess had a chance to speak with Ostinelli and Belousova about the tonal trickery of The Romanoffs, their inspirations, and the fruits of collaboration.
Giona Ostinelli – Photo Credit: Tim Navis / Sonya Belousova – Photo Credit: Artonix Studios
How did you two start composing music as a duo?
Ostinelli: Years back I was scoring a David Mamet-produced movie Two-Bit Waltz, which required a very pianistic and virtuosic approach. I do play piano, however, I’m no virtuoso. And I knew Sonya was a phenomenal composer and a virtuoso concert pianist.
Belousova: So, Giona asked me one day if I was interested in collaborating on the score, and I thought, “That sounds like a very curious project, so why not!”
Why do you think you work so well together? What are the benefits of collaborating, as opposed to working independently?
Belousova: We work so well together because we come from such different music backgrounds. Growing up in Russia, I have been exposed to the strong classical music education Russia is well-regarded for. Giona, on the other hand, comes from [a] bands-type of environment. We found that we work extremely well together because we’re not trying to compete with each other…
Ostinelli: Well, secretly we are…
Belousova: … but instead, we complement each other’s style. Writing music for films and television means you have to be extremely versatile. So, we have this aspect fully covered.
Ostinelli: It also means spending many hours in the studio. You have a lot of music to write and a very little amount of time to do it.
Belousova: For example, Giona would come up with an idea, which I would then extend or complement with something completely different from what he originally imagined, and vice versa. This leads to new discoveries and approaches we wouldn’t think of otherwise.
Ostinelli: Exactly! You spend hours working on a cue, and when it’s time to move on to the next cue, usually one of us comes up with something creative, which then inspires the other one, and it just keeps going. And if it doesn’t happen, well, lunch break!
Belousova: Jokes aside, we basically feed off each other’s enthusiasm and ideas. We inspire each other. You never know where the inspiration will come from. Maybe Giona starts messing around with different instruments in the studio, which then gives me an idea on how to structure the next cue. Or I start a motif on the piano, which then we develop, add other instruments and elements. Working together is also very effective in terms of knowing when something works or doesn’t.
Both of you have worked on a variety of projects throughout your careers, from movies and television shows to theatrical productions and, in Sonya’s case, the YouTube channel Player Piano. What motivates you to take on a certain project?
Belousova: One of the important factors for us is a project that presents a challenge and it presents an opportunity to try something new and exciting. Beyond that, it’s all about the incredible people we get to collaborate with. The most amazing script does not always perfectly translate into a film, and so a very important creative aspect for us is the people we get to work with.
Ostinelli: Yes, very true. The story is what draws us initially to a project, however, what keeps the inspiration going is the creative team we get to work with. Making a film or a TV show is a very long journey, and therefore, it’s important we surround ourselves with people who inspire us.
Belousova: We were incredibly lucky to be surrounded by a fantastic team on The Romanoffs. Matthew Weiner is a perfectionist with a great ear. You can’t ask for a better collaborator. No small detail escapes him… Being extremely hardcore perfectionists ourselves, our work ethics match 100 percent.
Isabelle Huppert and Christina Hendricks in The Romanoffs (2018). Photo Credit: Amazon Studios
How did The Romanoffs come about? What interested you about the series?
Ostinelli: How could we not get involved with The Romanoffs? Especially with Sonya being Russian and from St. Petersburg. Before being exiled, the Romanoffs used to live in The Winter Palace in St. Petersburg, so who knows? Perhaps Sonya could actually be a descendant from them…
Belousova: We actually expressed our interest in the show over a year ago. We both saw The Romanoffs as a project different from anything we’ve done so far. When they entered post-production, we received a phone call that Matthew Weiner was interested in a meeting.
Ostinelli: I guess he heard there was a Romanoff descendant living in Los Angeles.
When starting on a new composition, how do you figure out what direction to take? Do you have any strategies?
Ostinelli: Well, with me being half-Italian, I have to stay true to my roots. Hence, I have to be the more dramatic of the two. So, when starting every new project, my approach is simple: “Our last score was so cool. There’s absolutely no way we could ever top that!”
Belousova: That’s describing it mildly.
Ostinelli: True. However, then my Swiss side kicks in, and we start creating themes, sonorities, textures, building the sound palette relevant to this specific project, putting down ideas and developing them.
Belousova: Whenever possible, we love writing from the script, as it gives us an opportunity to explore and let the imagination loose. So, this [is] one of the scenarios of how the process might start. However, since music and image coexist and complement each other, there will definitely be other elements, like cinematography, colors, lighting, pace of editing, which will influence the score and its sound palette.
Ostinelli: Every new project is a new process, so until you start you never really know which approach will be the most effective.
The Romanoffs is an anthology series with episodes scored by different composers, including Anton Sanko and David Carbonara. Were you conscious of their work while composing “The House of Special Purpose”? Or did you set out to create an entirely distinct sound?
Ostinelli: We intentionally avoided listening to the scores for the other episodes, so we wouldn’t be influenced by what Anton Sanko or David Carbonara were writing.
Belousova: The score is always driven by the story. With every episode exploring a different story written in a different style and genre [and] starring a different cast, the music also had to be different from episode to episode. Therefore we were focused on writing the best possible scores for “House of Special Purpose” and the season finale, “The One That Holds Everything”.
Kerry Bishé in The Romanoffs (2018). Photo Credit: Amazon Studios
Sonya, you are from Saint Petersburg. Although The Romanoffs doesn’t take place in Russia, Russian history is incorporated into the show’s story and production, including its music. Did your heritage influence your approach to the score?
Belousova: Most definitely. For example, there was a scene, which required a… distinctly Russian approach, so we wrote a piano concerto for the scene. Imagine, for me as a concert pianist, this was literally like a dream come true to compose and record a piano concerto for the series. For another scene, we wrote a domra concerto. Domra is a Russian folk instrument of the lute family used widely in Russian folk orchestras.
Matthew has a lot of appreciation for Russian classical music. Needless to say, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Shchedrin, and Stravinsky are some of my favorite composers. Therefore we definitely wanted to include some of the Russian “flavors” in the score. However, [we] wanted to keep a broader perspective at the same time. The range of music style for the series varies immensely from classical to highly experimental. We have an orchestra, virtuoso soloists, fragile and intimate chamber strings, Russian traditional folk instruments, hints of Hollywood’s Golden Age sound, electronic textures and elaborate synths.
As you mentioned, the score for “The House of Special Purpose”, like the episode itself, juggles a range of tones and styles. How do you navigate such tricky tonal shifts through music?
Ostinelli: That’s the fun!
Belousova: That’s when our different music backgrounds come to play. Having to navigate through unexpected tonal shifts and different genres and styles is much more interesting for us creatively.
Ostinelli: After you finish a cue and have to start a new one that requires something completely different stylistically, you do need a couple of minutes to readjust mentally. But [in] the end, that’s exactly what we love. Both “House of Special Purpose” and “The One That Holds Everything” gave us this wonderful opportunity.
Belousova: When we started working on “House of Special Purpose”, we divided the cues by genres and themes. All the classical themes were fully written and orchestrated on paper. The playful theme when Christina Hendricks’ character exits her hotel reoccurs several times, each time developing further. The romantic theme first introduced when Christina and Jack Huston’s characters walk back to the hotel appears later on in its extended modified version during Christina and Isabelle Huppert’s bedroom conversation. The mysterious theme introduced at the very beginning when Christina’s character is watching a shoot gets developed later on in several scenes, including a longer version in the scene when she storms back to the hotel after being unable to make a phone call.
Ostinelli: Even though the episode takes places in a modern time, it definitely has a period look and feel to it… Therefore, when approaching the electronic cues, we wanted to stay away from more modern synths and rather went with an old-school approach by creating the textures and sonorities on vintage synths. Instead of recording directly into Pro Tools, we first recorded via a tape recorder to give it a more distinct vintage feel.
Jumping off the previous question, did you use any films or shows as inspiration?
Ostinelli: The deadline for “House of Special Purpose” was so tight that we didn’t have any time to think about other films or shows. It was more a situation of: “Okay, we have a week and a half to write, record, mix, and deliver the score for an episode of a feature film length. We have no time to waste here!”
Belousova: After we spotted the episode and had an in-depth discussion on what Matthew was looking for musically, we went back to our studio and immediately started writing.
Ostinelli: With “The One That Holds Everything”, we had a luxury of receiving the episode in advance. However, we stayed away from listening to other scores anyways, because the inspiration for us came from the picture itself and our conversations with Matthew.
Near the end of “The House of Special Purpose”, Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet is used. Did you choose that cue, or was that done by the music supervisor? How do you determine whether to compose original music or use pre-existing music?
Belousova: Correct. There’s “Dance of the Knights” from Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet used in “House of Special Purpose”. Matthew is very specific in his music choices, whether it’s score or licensed music. Sometimes he’s the one choosing the licensed music. Other times, it’s the editor when temping the episode, and other times it’s [Alexandra] Patsavas, the music supervisor. With this particular cue, if I remember right, it was Matthew’s idea. It worked so beautifully with the scene; anything else wouldn’t have been as effective.
Ostinelli: Regarding the usage of original music versus licensed music, it’s a different process each time. With The Romanoffs, by the time we were on board, all the songs were already selected and present in the cut. There were several cues Matthew planned to license at first, however, we felt like writing an original score for those scenes would enhance them in a way the licensed material couldn’t. An example is the domra concerto we wrote for the scene when Christina Hendricks’ character exits the hotel in “House of Special Purpose”.
Belousova: Without giving anything away, there is also a beautiful montage scene in “The One That Holds Everything” that we felt was asking for an original score instead of a licensed song, and so we wrote an original cue. We felt like the song that was there originally wasn’t providing enough for the scene and we could give more meaning to it. So we went for it, and Matthew absolutely loved it. That’s the great thing about working with Matthew, he gives you room to be creative.
What did you find most challenging about working on The Romanoffs? Most rewarding?
Ostinelli: It was a very smooth process from start to finish. It was a matter of understanding what exactly Matthew was looking for and then just fine-tuning the score from there.
Belousova: When Matthew heard our very first music pass for “The One That Holds Everything”, he was literally about to change the dub mix schedule as he thought the score was ready.
Ostinelli: It was a true pleasure working with every single member of The Romanoffs team.
In general, what do you like about composing for film and TV?
Ostinelli: That every project gives you an opportunity to explore something new, whether it’s a new style, genre, or sonority. We always look for new ways of reinventing ourselves while maintaining our distinct voice. Films and television give you that unique opportunity.
Belousova: With The Romanoffs, we got a chance to compose music in a wide variety of styles and genres. We wrote a piano concerto, a domra concerto. We got to write sophisticated orchestral pieces and play with vintage synths. We got to explore my Russian influences, and so much more.
Ostinelli: With Sacred Lies, another TV series we recently scored, we had an amazing opportunity of writing and producing not only the score, but also the original songs for the show, including writing the lyrics. That was a terrific experience because it’s so beautiful when you can transform a music theme into a song and blur the lines between how a score and songs interact with each other. Sonya recorded the vocals for all the original songs. Writing the soundtrack for Sacred Lies was basically like producing a record. The soundtrack comes out on October 26 via Lakeshore Records, check it out.
Belousova: Or last year we scored M.F.A, where we got a chance to create an incredibly intricate and effective score by sampling Francesca Eastwood’s phrases from her production dialogue.
Ostinelli: Or with The Mist, the Paramount show we did [in 2017], we spent a couple of weeks in the studio just recording pianos creating the weirdest otherworldly sonorities [they] could possibly produce. We plucked the strings, bowed them, used various mallets, threw lithium batteries on the strings or screamed into them to record the resonance, you name it. And then these unique sounds became the foundation of the score.
Belousova: So, to sum it up, this is how we love approaching every new project. Film and television are the mediums that provide us with this opportunity.
New episodes of The Romanoffs air Fridays on Amazon Prime Video.