‘Obi-Wan Kenobi’ Composer Natalie Holt on Giving A New Musical Perspective to the World of ‘Star Wars’
Composer Natalie Holt talks to FilmSpeak about working on the three biggest current film and TV franchises, and collaborating with Deborah Chow and John Williams on ‘Obi-Wan Kenobi’.
In a short amount of time, composer Natalie Holt accomplished the incredible feat of composing music for the Marvel Cinematic Universe with Loki (and its upcoming second season), Star Wars with Obi-Wan Kenobi, and, coming soon, the DC Extended Universe with Batgirl, which is slated to release on HBO Max next year. On having been able to lend her musical vision to the three biggest current film and TV franchises right now, Holt described the experience as “a bit of a rush. I’m thrilled to be asked and glad I managed to get through it, but it's been quite intense [laughs].”
And on trying to make her score unique in the MCU for Loki, Holt said that her ideas came from a combination of her taste and the script: “It just felt right for the script to be dotting all over the place and using ‘70s synths, analog sounds and messing things around with clocks and things like that. I guess it was the creative direction of [director] Kate Herron and my own taste, and just what I felt the story called for.”
On working with director Deborah Chow for Obi-Wan Kenobi, Holt expressed that she had specific input on how the score would match the atmosphere that was crafted for the series:
“What we both didn’t know was if John [Williams] was going to come on board and if we were going to be allowed to use the heritage themes. So Deborah wanted to do something without the themes, just because it all has to go through John Williams. With Rogue One and The Mandalorian, he didn’t grant permission. So she wanted to do something away from it just in case we got stuck, and we couldn't use it. And then once he came on board, it changed the dialogue quite a lot, and just set the tentpoles up for the style of the show.”
And on John Williams’ contribution to Obi-Wan Kenobi, Holt said that his theme inspired her throughout the series on other pieces of music:
“I got to work it into some of my bits. John doesn't do demos, so I never got to hear his end of things. But he did send me the piano reduction score. And so I played the theme on the piano directly from John Williams. And that was just incredible. Knowing that I was one of the few people that heard the theme. And then I got to see him conduct as well on his 90th birthday, which was just incredible because I'm such a big fan. It just felt like a huge honor to be there for that.”
On balancing the heritage themes with the newer pieces of music she wrote for the show, Holt said that these moments came from John Williams and Deborah Chow:
“That very much came from John because he watched it through. Deborah also pinpointed where those themes were going to be. And my job was to kind of write the new material. Obviously, I knew those themes were coming in episode 6. Deborah didn't want to use the Imperial March theme until episode six. She had a specific reason why because Darth Vader [Hayden Christensen/James Earl Jones] is still Anakin. He says [to Obi-Wan], “You didn't kill Anakin. I did.” Then, we hear the Imperial March and have the Vader we know. Deborah just wanted him to feel terrified because he’s at the peak of his kind of evilness, after the killing spree we see in episode 3.”
We’ve never seen Alderaan in a live-action Star Wars title quite like this, and Holt went through multiple iterations of the theme for it to match the tone of what was shot for the series:
“My initial step was that I wanted the music to have a Latin American feel to it, but it just didn't work because the buildings looked kind of modern and space-age that it felt like the music needed to be kind of cleaner. And then we tried clean and modern synths, which sounded like a Mac computer opening up, which had this clean energy to it, but it felt too cold. And so we wanted to bring the warmth of the place because the Organas are meant to be this lovely royal family and inclusive. And so we blended the synths with this slight fanfare, which became the Alderaan theme in the end.”
Holt had two personal favorite pieces of music that she composed for the show, which was for the most emotional scenes:
“I really liked the two emotional pieces, where Nari [Benny Safdie] is hanging, because I got to kind of go out of the John theme and into the sadness of these refugees. The Jedi are now persecuted [by the Empire]. I love those emotional moments where you kind of get a punch of feeling and when Tala [Indira Varma] dies in episode five, that felt like a really powerful moment. And I got this amazing violinist, James Ehnes, to come and do the violin solos for me. It was such a joy to get to work with him.”
Holt also talked about adding rhythm to the series’ action sequences, but she also worked on Lê Văn Kiệt’s The Princess, which was released on Hulu and Disney+ last week. On envisioning the score for a film that assembles one constant action scene after the next, Holt said that the most challenging aspect of it was to find a particular rhythm that would fit well with the action scenes presented on the screen:
“I had this idea initially, because the location of the film is unclear. It’s like a fairy tale, or not really. But it is kind of medieval. So I was like, “Oh, maybe I could do something exotic for this.” And this was my initial idea because I watched Kiệt’s film called Furie before I scored this. So I was imagining using the gamelan and doing these polyrhythmic patterns because I love the Gamelan as an instrument. I just think it has a really magical, hypnotic sound. And then I was imagining the action to be more feminine and just draw you in, but not being so driving, and it just didn't work. And when we did a test run, we recorded with a gamelan, and it was just not sticking to the picture. So then we did something more driving with drums, guitars, and a big orchestra.. We also used the medieval instruments in there, but in a punky, rhythmic kind of way, which seemed to stick.”
One of Holt’s upcoming projects is Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah’s Batgirl. Of course, most of the film is being kept under wraps right now, and we don’t know much about the tone of the score. However, she did say one thing about the experience of working on the film, which involved meeting Danny Elfman, who composed Tim Burton’s Batman movies, starring Michael Keaton who will make his grand return as the Caped Crusader in The Flash and Batgirl:
“I have met Danny Elfman this year, and it's like “Oh, my god. I've met John Williams, Carter Burwell, John Powell, and Danny Elfman this year.” I feel like this has been one of those crazy years where I've literally I've just met all of my heroes [laughs].”