Meanwhile, Kent started going deeper and deeper into authentic jazz as he composed. “But when I played some music for Alexander, he asked ‘where’s that Rolfe melody?’ so I realized that what he was looking for was an amalgam of jazz ideas with my kind of thematic composing, which is what I ultimately did.”
The big challenge for the perfectionist Kent came during the recording of the score. “It was really hard for a control freak like me to simply let go of the music and realize that jazz isn’t something you can get too exacting about,” he comments. “Instead, you have to take the music into the studio, get some really soulful and expert musicians, and watch as something totally unpredictable and magical happens! Ultimately, SIDEWAYS became an incredible lesson for me in music making. I consider the score to be both mine and not mine, as the talents that went into it really brought so much to the music.”
Throughout the process, Alexander Payne also gave Kent the freedom to experiment creatively. “It was a great help that Alexander was into the music being very organic,” the composer notes. “He was at all the recording sessions, always encouraging me to try new things.
He made it clear that picture accuracy wasn’t that important – but it was the life and the energy of the music that counted.”
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