I got a call from my agent on a Monday asking if I had any motion samples she could share with a potential client who was interested in creating a video of a musical performance for a major brand. Although I’ve recorded sound on set many times (mostly for interviews or dialog), I didn't have anything like live music recordings in my portfolio. However, Josh Jones, the DP I have been working with a lot this past fall, has a ton of experience shooting music videos. My agent got the green light to deliver something by the following Monday, so I thought there was a chance we could pull something together.

After I confirmed Josh was available, I immediately started looking for musicians. The ask was for a group of performers together, but I only had leads on a musician or two. That’s when one of Josh’s contacts referred Desiree, a cellist. She was interested and available, and at the time, my only talent. So I pivoted my overall idea and thought we could make a strong piece starring a single performer.

But later that night, another friend who saw an Instagram post I made, referred Jeff, an accomplished violinist. I immediately had a vision of filming a dramatic call-and-response piece. Something that, like my brand, invoked a sense of freshness and tenderness. And both musicians seemed up for the challenge, despite not knowing each other.

My producer, Trevor, and I then got to the business of securing a location with help from Kate Levinson. We needed a room with a stage – nothing too modern – engineered to capture sound, but that also reflected the nature of the piece and offered some ability to showcase scale. We scouted a couple of locations on Tuesday, but they didn’t feel right. We contacted Thalia Hall, and, miraculously, they said we could take a look on Wednesday. As in, 24 hours before the shoot! Wednesday comes, I scout the space, and it’s perfect! All we needed was a lighting tech to operate the stage lighting.

While I added lighting tech to my growing to-do list, I did manage to secure a styling team. Problem was, we didn’t receive talent sizes until midday. That left only that afternoon for clothing pulls. Thankfully, my assistant, Jack Goodwin, and Josh's assistant, Doug Birch, were both available and willing to help. Josh also had a sound contact, Alan Chow who was available.

As all of this was happening, I was researching video techniques and music for inspiration, on top of trying to find a way to make dust on the instrument strings for one of our close-up shots. Luckily that night Desiree came through with a solve – Rosin. She said it’s something cellists use on their bows.

With one mystery solved, I continued pulling stills and talked through a rough shot list with Josh. But a lot of the decisions I still needed to make were hinging on the musicians – whom I had yet to meet. Besides that, everything was miraculously coming together. Except that when I went to bed that night, I dreamt the venue had a mix-up and I had to push call time from 8 am to noon.

I got up the next morning and headed to my studio to pick up Jack and some gear. We stopped by Dodd Rental for a boom, then set off for the location. As the musicians arrived, we sent Desiree to hair and makeup, while we selected wardrobe. Both musicians got dressed and wired with microphones for sound recording. The crew set up lighting, while Trevor got us breakfast and, as always, kept things running smoothly.

Then it happened – I finally got to work with our talent! My vision was a 30 to 60 second video where both musicians had solos along with moments where they played together. I wanted Desiree to start and leave an opening for Jeff to respond. Desiree improvised an opening on the spot and Jeff jumped in with some beautiful solo phrases. They went back and forth a few times, deciding which keys to land on and pass off to each other, while I helped them time it and pull some of their ideas together. I encouraged them to bring as much feeling to the work as possible. And the piece we came up with felt perfect.

With music and timing set, we worked on solidifying blocking for Jeff. I wanted it to feel like a surprise reveal when the viewer saw him, so we arranged the curtains to hide him. We started with a wide shot from the balcony for coverage. We used stage lights and a boomed backlight for the shot. Two takes, and we moved on.

Next, we went to what I thought might be the most interesting angle – directly behind the musicians. We had Trevor and Jack point two Par lights directly into the camera to amplify the stage lights. We did one take straight through, and then a few with the lights turning on at the beginning, and off at the end – just to have as options.

Our third angle was from the side. This was the big reveal of Jeff. We used a backlight and a v-flat for fill. We had Jeff step into frame and light on cue, in case we wanted to reveal him from that angle.

For the last scene, we changed to a 100mm lens and shot a series of close-ups. This was where we needed the dust coming off of the bow. And where I thought we might capture the bulk of the shots. It looked amazing! We did a handful of takes and wrapped. 4.5 hours, start to finish.

I spent the next day editing with my DP. After he synced the audio, we started looking at different options for the opening. We had shots of lights coming on behind Desiree which we thought could work, but my original vision – to start on black and come in tight on the strings – ended up working best. We also had an option for the lights to turn off at the end, but I liked cutting right instead. We did a lot of experimenting. Sometimes we wanted a close-up of Desiree’s hands but didn’t have them in the right section of the music. Mind you, we only had 15 takes. It was also tricky syncing up the audio because it was an improvised piece that didn’t have rehearsed timing. But as we got closer, we got excited.

What we ended up with was a 40-second video. The musicians pretty much had to play the same way for every take for us to properly sync up their bow movements with sound. This was a major source of stress for me in the planning phase. It was really important to me to use music that the viewer would not have heard before so they would be hearing it for the first time. And it paid off!

A production that is pulled together that quickly is bound to suffer, so I was prepared for there to be flaws. Parts we wished we had done differently. But, it turned out perfectly. Every bit how I envisioned it.

I could not have done it without all the people who helped me plan and execute my vision: