CineConcerts was very fortunate to talk with Ozie Cargile, about his beginnings in music, his experiences at the Sundance Film Music Lab, and his upcoming projects in musical virtual reality.

Ozie first developed a relationship with music through the piano, which grew into an interest in composition.

CineConcerts (CC): I just want to start with a little bit of your background, how did you decide that film composition was something that you wanted to do?

Ozie Cargile (OC): Wow, that is a beautiful question. Film composition came to me through the world of filmmaking. Originally, as a very young boy in Detroit, I wanted to be Steven Spielberg. I was getting into animation and getting really excited around the world of film, and I noticed there was this composer by the name of John Williams who was in the credits of all his films.

So, I decided to check this guy out and, serendipitously, this was right around the time my mom had gotten a piano. The combination of these two things, me being really inspired by the music of John Williams and me having access to a piano, naturally formed a fit. And this really came to a head one Christmas. My mom gifted me the sheet music for Jurassic Park and I was on the piano determined to learn the music. Eventually, I did and I realized that this man had created a career from his music and I wanted to do the same thing. 

So, we go all the way back to childhood, to the beginning, that’s where it comes from. In terms of film music nowadays, it really was about me coming out to Los Angeles and getting a chance to realize what a film music career looks like.

CC: How did you get started on the piano? Was there someone in your family who played, or a specific teacher?

OC: I am largely self-taught thanks to my mom who allowed me to play the instrument. One Christmas, my dad surprised my mom with a piano. She always wanted to play as a little girl and she never got the chance to learn. So, he bought her a piano and we, my sister and I, were not allowed to play, we were not allowed to touch it, we were not to treat it like a toy, it was a serious instrument, and that was that. 

Then, I was in the sixth grade taking a music class, and for part of the class we had to go through all the instrument classes. So, I played the recorder, I played cornet, viola for the strings, and at the end of the semester, I got the chance to play the piano, which was what I really wanted to play. It was a bit of a forbidden desire because I couldn’t play it at home. And when I came home with the piano assignment and I said,

‘Mom, I have to do my homework, and my homework is to play the piano.’ 

She actually embraced it and she said,

‘Well, if this is your assignment, make sure you do it right.’ 

She saw that I really took a liking to it and encouraged me to seriously pursue the instrument. I was raised in Church, so I had a lot of experiences around understanding the music from that culture and learning music in that style. And I was in Detroit, so there is the whole legacy of Motown. There were a lot of things that really pushed me to become a musician. I could have just as easily become a scientist or some other form of expressive intelligence. But there is something about the way my life was shaped that music and piano, in particular, were right for me.

CC: That’s awesome. I am always so impressed when people have that innate musical ability.

OC: Yeah, and having someone who inspires you to pursue it. I don’t know if this has come out in your research, but I also teach piano.

CC: Yes, we saw that! 

OC: I created this video course and book called the Quicklessons Piano Course. So, the piano was important not just in terms of me being inspired as a child, but also my career as an adult. The marriage of those two things has been a phenomenal influence.

CC: When you got to college, where did you go, and what were you studying?

OC: I went to the University of Michigan; I was at the School of Music studying composition, with a principle in piano performance. That was a wonderful time in life. I am very fond of the School of Music.

CC: You went to the Hollywood Music Workshop in Austria, is that something that came up through your time at The University of Michigan? 

OC: Actually yes, so that’s another one of those examples where you see the through-line in your life and you realize just how connected everything is. At the address for my graduation at the University of Michigan (Class of 2003), I met Conrad Pope who was one of the principal orchestrators for John Williams, and had actually worked on the orchestrations for Jurassic Park. He gave a very inspirational address, and I got the chance to talk to him afterward. He gave me his contact information and we stayed in touch throughout the years.

I graduated in 2003. In 2015, I attended another masterclass at the university that Conrad Pope was giving. Because he lived in Los Angeles and I lived in Detroit we didn’t really get a chance to see each other, so I definitely wanted to go down there and see him, and pick his brain about orchestration. I spoke to him after his masterclass and he said, “Come to Baden”, just like that, “Come to Vienna, come to the Hollywood Music Workshop and study with me.” And as destiny would have it, I could afford to do it.

This was my chance to go to the great city of Vienna, with the history and everything there, and I took it. And as a result of the Hollywood Music Workshop, I learned a lot of tricks of the trade, and being able to study with Conrad privately helped me go to that next level of confidence as a composer.

CC: How did you end up at the Sundance Film Music Lab?

OC: I am going to use this opportunity as concisely as I can to honor this connection. I came to Los Angeles last year and I didn’t really know anyone here, but I had the ambition to share my talents with the industry. I found a mentor on Facebook by the name of Bruce Nahin, who told me to come to Los Angeles and as soon as I came to contact him. So, I did that and he invited me to an event he was hosting with the Producers Guild of America. I’m at this cocktail party just being personable and I happen upon this person named Butch Kaplan. I asked him for advice, “What should I be looking for?” He told me to look up a man by the name of Chris Douridas, a music supervisor and KCRW radio host, “Say that Butch Kaplan sent you.”

So, I emailed Chris, to my great surprise, he emailed me right back! He told me that he hosted a party every Monday night in Hollywood called School Night, and to come down there to meet him. So, I went and we hit it off. Chris has been a tremendous blessing in my life, not just in terms of introducing me to mentors in the industry, like composer Harry Gregson-Williams, but also just being a great friend, someone you can really depend on when you really need them.

And it’s largely because of Chris that I came into the full knowledge of the Sundance Film Music Program. I got a chance to meet Peter Golub and eventually apply to that program, and was very fortunate to be accepted. And then that program changed my life.

CC: Can you share a little bit about what you do in the Sundance Music Lab? What is the structure like?

OC: The program is two weeks, and it’s divided into two parts. The first week, we were paired with a composer or a group of composers. In my particular case, I worked with Marco Beltrami and Christophe Beck. I had to score scenes that they had scored. They mentor you through that, and you get feedback. This is a real workshop, talking with the veteran composers about how you approach a scene. And it’s not just about the creative aspects, we got a lot of training around how to set up your plugins, your DAW (Digital Audio Workstation), a lot of technical issues and organizational things that you need to be aware of as a film composer in the modern age. That was the first part of the intensive.

The second part of the intensive was working with directors from the Sundance Directors Program who have already made films. We scored their scenes and worked with them just like we would in the industry. So, we spent time alone with the directors, got to know them, watched the scenes, and this is in the midst of all the masterclasses, where you also get a chance to meet your idols, like Alan Silvestri. And that part of the program was wildly educational because it was real world: at the end of the week there was a premiere of the scenes in the theater, and you have to actually negotiate the score with your directors in time to meet that deadline.

I had two directors that I was working with for the movie The Hunt and I learned a lot, working with them, recording with the orchestra and finally presenting at the Skywalker Sound Stag Theater. And I didn’t mention this part earlier, but in the midst of all of this, we are literally walking through the streets of heaven on the Skywalker Ranch. There are hills and valleys and beautiful spaces. The program is pretty intense, so the location needed to be peaceful. Also, Skywalker Sound is where a lot of movies are mixed, so you have that opportunity to talk to the people who are not necessarily composers, but are definitely an integral part of the film industry.

I should have mentioned this earlier, but they actually pair you with a sound designer, and I worked with Stephen Urata. Steve actually worked on some of the films that came through Skywalker and working with him on The Hunt was great because I not only saw the director’s perspective, but I got the chance to see the sound designer’s perspective as well. I think that’s really important because when you are scoring a film, you are not just scoring to the narrative presented by the dialogue or the action of the characters. Every sound that’s happening in that film affects the situation, it contributes significantly to the experience. And that sound is actually designed. You sit down with your sound designer and plan out what can be accomplished by music or sound design, and then you marry those things together. So now, you aren’t just writing music, but actually scoring this entire experience with your collaborators.

When I say it was life changing, it really was. It brought me into a space, not just as a composer but as a black composer. I think having that opportunity, being in that space and being exposed to the knowledge and the wealth of experience that was there, and adding that to who I am, was a life changing experience. And so, moving forward from that signaled that I was here, in Los Angeles. And as a result of that, more opportunities came.

Most recently I had the opportunity to work with the composer Michael Abels who did the scores for Jordan Peele’s Us and Get Out. Working with him was a beautiful experience. And then there have been other projects that have come. I had the chance to write the score for The Chadwick Journals which is an LGBT+ themed series. As a result of going to that program, I not only met people and opportunities came, but once I got into the situations where opportunities came I knew exactly what to do. I had the necessary training to fall back on. And that’s beyond writing music, that’s skills for life. 

CC: I love getting the rundown for that program! We hear about it a lot, but we never really get the insider’s take and it sounds like it was really informative but not just musically, also business-wise.

OC: I will add this too, I want to shout out all the mentors and other creatives who really created an environment that was so full of love, people like Courtney Rodriguez, Jongnic Bontemps and Michael Miller. Of all the wonderful things that I take from it, that is the thing I really appreciate. You have a sense that you were invited into a family and it dispelled a lot of the mythology of the dog-eat-dog nature of the industry, particularly around Hollywood and Los Angeles. It felt, instead, like there was a consciousness in the environment that welcomed new talent, that welcomed diversity. And you understood that you were a part of that and they were going to be there for you, to help give you that push to take your career as a composer to the next level. “We love you”, that was the message. I recommend anyone apply to the program.

CC: Where do you see yourself going forward as a composer, as someone who is still finding their footing in the industry? Is there a project you want to focus on or something that you are specifically pursuing?

OC: I have come to this place where I have reevaluated myself as a composer. I started off as a young kid with his Jurassic Park book, just wanting to learn piano, and then, once I got a little older, I thought, now I am going to learn orchestration like John Williams. Then, I really got into orchestral music. That’s what my time at the University of Michigan was about. And then eventually, I made my way out to Los Angeles and here I am working on film projects. However, the through-line that I see there is really a propensity towards narrative, wanting to tell a story. I have come to this place where I also want to tell my story as a composer.

It’s interesting, I started being inspired by Spielberg because of his ability to take you into a moment and throughout my career there have been pieces of mine that have been performed and used for projects, but then there's a whole repertoire of mine that is unknown, or largely unknown because they’re passion projects. They’re just pieces of music that I wrote that express my ideas apart from a project that I have been hired to score. So, now I want to take those works and bring them to the forefront of my career and really do justice for them.

One of the things I am working on right now is a project called The Majestic Increaser of My Strength. It is a virtual reality experience that features twelve orchestral works of mine. This experience parallels a real-life experience that I had with the love of my life, Charles Hopkins—that is, our journey of coming to know each other the exploration of higher consciousness. This virtual reality experience gives me the opportunity to not only present my music, but to present a story that deals with the different things that I have gone through in my own life on the journey of higher consciousness.

The plan is to actually record it at Skywalker Sound. I have had discussions with the contactor over there and we’re working to get this project going, so we can get these works out in the virtual reality experience. I see it as the reimagining of my career. I want to definitely continue as a film composer, but I want to expand as a storyteller. And if I can accomplish that, it will be the next best chapter for me, not only because it will allow me to reimagine my music, but show the passion behind it and I think that’s just as important.

The Majestic Increaser of My Strength are our names, me and my partner Charles Hopkins. His middle name is Augustus and the translation of Charles Augustus is ‘Majestic Increaser’; and my name “Ozie” is an English transliteration of a Hebrew name that means ‘My Strength’. So, we put those two together as a representation of us. And the story goes on to talk about how that ‘us’ came to be.

CC: I wanted to just touch on your work with Joseph Gordon-Levitt and HitRECord, how did you get in touch and start scoring for the short pieces and other projects through his company?

OC: I can honestly say that Joe came from the Universe. I was in a meditation one evening just around my career, trying to find a turning point as a composer. I was in Detroit having a guided meditation, and in this meditation, I was going to meet a figure who was to give me the answer to my question and there was Joseph Gordon-Levitt. The question that I asked Joe was,

 “What is the secret to manifestation?”

He replied, “You are already doing it, you just have to own the things that you are manifesting.”

Of course, this is in my mind: my imagination, my experience in this guided meditation speaking from my subconscious, saying, “Go out and see what’s out there”. 

So, just out of curiosity I decided to look up Joseph Gordon-Levitt on Google. I already knew him from the movie Inception, so it made sense that he would be the character that came to me to talk about manifesting reality beyond what you see, and owning what you are manifesting, but I decided to dig a little deeper into the man himself.

And on his Wikipedia page, at the very bottom in the footnotes is a link to HitRECord. So, I went to the HitRECord website. At the time, it was not as big as it is now. It was a lot smaller of a community. I posted some of my music and one of the members of the group said,

“Here is a poem you should check out, it’s called Strawberry Bootlaces. One of the members, David Sugarman has written this and you should write music to it.”

I decided to go for it. Right then I recorded some piano underscore for his voiceover and I uploaded that to the site. And the man himself, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, the next day, came on to the front page of his website praising the work. He goes on to take that work, Strawberry Bootlaces, and make a short film out of it and premieres it at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival. 

It was a very organic relationship in this small community that was gradually growing, and they recognized my talent. There were a lot of projects that I collaborated on just for fun, and many of the hidden works that I told you about, which have stories behind them, were partly inspired by things that came from that website. But then, there were also paid projects. There were opportunities to come out to Los Angeles and perform with HitRECord. It’s just been a beautiful relationship through the years.

I actually performed with HitRECord at the last Sundance Film Festival that happened here in 2020. It’s just one of those situations you get into in life where you realize there is a group of people out there that care about the same things that you do. And they are interested in helping you get to the next level and creating that reality for yourself. As a result of the music that I created from the inspiration of HitRECord, my repertoire is that much more advanced.

Some of the music that is in the virtual reality experience is from HitRECord collaborations. If you are a new artist or a veteran artist, and you want a community where your artwork will be appreciated, and you will have the chance to collaborate on things that could possibly end up having your name credited, check out HitRECord. I won’t say it's a promise of fame, but it is a promise of recognition and that which comes from the community.  It's a beautiful, beautiful website, go participate.

CC: I wanted to just touch on the Quicklessons Piano Course again, how did that originally come about?

OC: The Quicklessons Piano Course started as an idea back in 2009. Back then, I called it “Learning Piano for Songwriters and Composers.” I wanted a program for all the young cats like me who wanted to know the chords, who wanted to know the real chord progressions. A lot of times when you look at the curriculum for beginner lessons, it’s not the stuff we actually want to play, it’s not the stuff that actually inspires us: those rich harmonies, the advanced arrangements, I’m talking about R&B, jazz, gospel, as well as classical. You really want to get in there and learn the music. So, I wanted to create a piano course for people who are dedicated to the craft of music. And after I created the course, I created additional videos and called them “quick lessons.” That took off and it caught on as the name for the course. It’s available at Quicklessonspiano.com and it's focused on actually getting you the skills that you need to explore the genres we were talking about. The course book is available on Amazon.

This was 2009. It was the height of the Bush recession, the economy was collapsing and we have this man named Barack Obama, who might be able to lead us beyond that. I had worked at two piano stores teaching students privately and both of them had closed. So, I needed a way to take the knowledge that I had built over eight years of teaching and put it into a form I could still share with students and get it out there. 

The Quicklessons Piano Course wasn’t just me wanting to inspire the next Ozie Cargile, but it was a direct response to the times. And it just so happened to align with the way education is going. I believe we are moving into a space where self-education is going to be the new college or university level education. So, I am very fortunate to have gotten in at a time before it was as popular as it is today. I am pleased to say that Quicklessons is still profitable today, and if you want to learn piano, it's a great course.