Writer/director, Tony D’Aquino (left), working on the music score for The Furies with head of the ANU School of Music, Professor Kenneth Lampl (right)

Award-winning American composer and head of the ANU School of Music, Professor Kenneth Lampl, is creating the original music for upcoming horror film The Furies – the first production by Canberra-based film studio, The Film Distillery. He’ll be working on the score with his Danish composing partner and wife, Kirsten Axelholm. Written and directed by Tony D’Aquino, produced by Lisa Shaunessy of Arcadia (Sundance success story Killing Ground) and starring Rake and Neighbours actress Airlie Dodds, the film finished shooting in Canberra and Bywong in April. Currently in post-production, it’s the first of several projects from the Accelerator POD initiative conceived by The Film Distillery, Screen Canberra and international sales agent Odin’s Eye Entertainment.

Since taking the helm at the ANU School of Music in March 2017, Professor Lampl’s aim has been to turn it into a “21st century music school”, so he’s been active in becoming part of the emerging Australian film and video game industry as both a composer and mentor for his students. The Furies is the 85th film he’s composed music for across his career. Professor Lampl’s introduction to film music composition came in 1997 when he studied with legendary film composer, John Williams, most famous for scoring the Star Wars movie franchise. Other films Lampl has worked on include Pokemon: The First Movie; Ed Harris and Eva Longoria drama Frontera; crime drama Winter of Frozen Dreams with Thora Birch; psychological thriller Royal Kill (starring Pat Morita and Eric Roberts); and horror film Kandisha, starring David Carradine.

Writer/director, Tony D’Aquino, said he knew instantly that Professor Lampl’s previous experience with the horror genre made him the right person for the job: “My brief to Ken was to capture the essence of the sound of the great horror films from the ‘70s and ‘80s. Movies like Halloween, The Thing and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre that had fantastic and disturbing soundtracks. Ken and I have also talked about our love of the work of more classic style film composers such as Bernard Herrmann (Psycho) and John Williams (Jaws). And, of course, Ken has his own amazing style, so I’m excited to hear what all those influences give birth to. What I’ve heard so far is spot on!”

While Professor Lampl’s score relies heavily on classical strings and synthesisers, the orchestra sounds are custom-made sample libraries created by the composer especially for The Furies. He said: “One of the most important aspects of being a film composer in the 21st century is the opportunity to create a unique sound world for each film. I’ve been able to experiment, designing new sounds and making new string-based and electronic instruments. I enjoy exploring new sonic ground and creating my own sound libraries which go beyond the limitations of acoustic instruments alone.”
Professor Lampl and Kirsten Axelholm were recently the first Australian-based artists to hit No. 1 in the US Billboard Classical Charts with their classical reworking of Foreigner hits on the album ‘Foreigner with the 21st Century Symphony Orchestra and Chorus’. The record is still riding high at No. 2, nine weeks after release. The Furies is a female-driven survival thriller about eight unwilling participants in a deadly game, with the film’s name inspired by the group of Greek goddesses who exact vengeance on men who’ve wronged women. It will be distributed worldwide by Odin’s Eye Entertainment and is set to shock audiences everywhere in 2019.