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My guest today is Brian Vickers. He is a music supervisor at Disney. Yes, the Disney; Walt Disney Studios. He works on the in-house trailer department. He’s worked on a number of Disney films, including The Avengers, Star Wars: The Last Jedi & The Rise of Skywalker, Black Panther, Soul, Hamilton, Frozen II, Black is King, and many, many more.
He has worked at other trailer house and music supervision companies. He actually got a start as a performer and was a performer on The Sing Off.
We dig into all things sync licensing, specifically in the trailer department because that is Brian’s current specialty. But we talk about getting the sync licensing on both sides, so as an artist of course (always my angle). We spend a significant amount of time on how to become a music supervisor yourself. Brian gives some great tips for how to do that.
Quick links:
3:11 – Working as a music supervisor for Disney since COVID-19 hit and quarantine started
12:38 – “Custom spots” and what the conversations look like between music supervisors and musicians
17:41 – How to find reputable trailer music production companies
20:13 – Do these trailer houses have in-house composers or producers that they work with?
23:10 – Clearing tracks / staying away from samples and making supervisors’ jobs easier
25:35 – Placing a song because it is perfect and then it doesn’t work out when it ‘goes up the chain’
28:39 – Breaking down the song placement process
33:59 – Brian’s musical background
42:28 – Music supervisor and sync licensing community
45:40 – How to reach out to music supervisors
50:30 – How to become a music supervisor
58:00 – What it means to make it in the new music business
