We recently connected with ANTONIO DI IORIO and have shared our conversation below.

ANTONIO, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Can you open up about a risk you’ve taken – what it was like taking that risk, why you took the risk and how it turned out?

It is a highly competitive field to become a film composer. Composing film scores isn’t just about fame and compensation, which is what draws many people in. People must be aware that every year not a lot of films are produced, with the biggest ones always handled by the top composers who dominate the scene. This is all normal. Is there a chance for young composers to make it? Especially for young people introducing themselves for the first time, it is becoming more challenging, so they have to embrace the idea of taking risks. But what are these risks about? While we all know what they are, it never hurts to reiterate them. The first step, leaving their secure lives to move to Los Angeles on their own; being ready to spend years before having an opportunity; a key to success is to get hired as an assistant by an A-list composer and work hard until an opportunity arises; luck also plays a part in different ways.

A strong sense of perseverance and self-belief. Fossilizing on only one choice, on only one road, will never achieve the goals. The obvious thing to do is to participate in competitions, events, and screenings, meeting influential people without becoming petulant. It is important for composers to determine if this is a business they believe they can succeed in; this includes determining how confident they are in their readiness, preparedness, speed, and quality. Being honest with themselves is as important as proving your worth. Moreover, composers should never stop learning and improving; haughtiness and egocentrism are some of the worst enemies.
Additionally, composers are and always will be at the service of directors, producers, and studios. To enter the real business, aspiring composers need to learn this fundamental aspect specifically.

Eventually, after having worked on many different top-level movies as an assistant and additional writer, the real challenge starts when they establish themselves as lead composers. At that point, other skills, besides writing, besides the creative process, get involved, and composers must learn how to manage a team, manage a studio, schedules, recordings, infostructures, clients, etc. So it becomes evident that assistants and collaborators are essential to advancing the working machine.

ANTONIO, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I am a Los Angeles-based music composer for Film, TV and Classical Concerts. First and foremost, I am a classically trained composer, pianist, and conductor, with respective diplomas and master’s degrees in Piano, Composition and Orchestra Conducting obtained both in Italy (at the Music Conservatory) and in the United States. I began studying piano at the age of five and composing at the age of eight. Several of my compositions were performed in live concerts at renowned classical festivals and events in Italian and European cities shortly afterwards. Consequently, my desire to pursue a composer career was evident at an early age, especially after listening to orchestral works by Tchaikovsky, Respighi, and Stravinsky. In addition, I became very interested in music for film after listening to John Williams’s Hook at the age of nine. Since then, I have composed music for several short films, Italian TV shows for the SKY TV channel, including the music score for the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics, and more.

One of my most memorable concerts as a composer and conductor was in Amsterdam, where I conducted an Italian ensemble and performed several of my pieces, and in Brescia, where I led a gran gala concert with the Orchestra Filarmonica Franciacorta of Brescia as both composer and conductor. The concert program was composed of the most famous film music scores by Hollywood and Italian composers, including John Williams, Ennio Morricone, Hans Zimmer, Howard Shore, as well as a few of my orchestral compositions such as Sparks Battle, Celebrazioni and Dante In Paradisio. Later, I collaborated with orchestra conductors as a composer and orchestrator, recording my works on CDs.

After winning some important International Composition Awards such as the “Krakow Film Music Festival”, the “Bucchi”, “SKY Vancouver” and others, and first place missed by a whisker at the Transatlantic Composition Competition, together with two nominations at two editions of the “Hollywood Music In Media Awards”, In 2013, I moved to Los Angeles trying to experience the most important road in the area. It was especially important to me to attend the Krakow Film Music Festival (2013) since I met very important Hollywood professionals who presided over the jury and invited me to Los Angeles.

Shortly thereafter, I was admitted to the prestigious month-long ASCAP Film Scoring Workshop in LA on my first try (2014), where I met many wonderful people from the Hollywood film industry and film music business and had the chance to record my music at the legendary FOX scoring Stage conducting the spectacular Hollywood Scoring Orchestra. I owe everything to ASCAP and the marvellous people who work there and the people I met thanks to the Program. In particular, two wonderful people became my real mentors.

From there onwards, I started to slowly build my career, which, in a very short period of time, has led me to cover the important role of Senior Assistant and Additional Composer for Tom Holkenborg (aka Junkie XL, author of Mad Max Fury Road, Deadpool, Batman vs Superman with Hans Zimmer), one of the top-level Hollywood composers. I’ve worked with Tom for four years (2016-2020), and my music can be massively heard in movies like:
– “Godzilla vs Kong” (Legendary Entertainment, Warner Bros) by Adam Wingard;
– “Zack Snyder’s Justice League” (Atlas Entertainment and HBOMax) by Zack Snyder (uncredited);
– “Sonic The Hedgehog” (Paramount Pictures) by Jeff Fowler;
– “Terminator: Dark Fate” (20th Century Fox, Skydance, Paramount Pictures, Lightstorm) by Tim Miller and James Cameron;
– “Mortal Engines” (MRC/Universal Pictures) by Peter Jackson;
– “Alita: Battle Angel” (Twentieth Century Fox) by Robert Rodriguez and James Cameron;
– “Tomb Raider” (Warner Bros./GK Films) by Roar Uthaug;
– “The Dark Tower” (Sony/Columbia Picture) by Nikolaj Arcel and Ron Howard;
– “Distance Between Dreams” (Red Bull).

I was so glad that my work at Tom Holkenborg’s studio led me to play a crucial role almost immediately. Right from the first projects, I felt I had a great privilege. In fact, I immediately started working alongside Tom in the creation of movie suites and demos to be submitted to the directors. At the same time, I was in charge to compose numerous cues on my own for those movies, and as time progressed, I was increasingly entrusted with more and more cues, reaching the point that I was trusted to handle large portions of the film scores myself. In light of my progress and my increasing responsibilities, Tom and I came to a conclusion that, after four years as an assistant and additional composer, my adventure would have to come to an end, and Tom thought I was ready to embark on my own career in film music.
He was not only a very good mentor to me, but we were (and still are) also very good friends. Additionally, I met other assistants who joined us later, and we immediately became very close.
As a result, in 2020, I moved out on my own and tried to find my way through collaborations with various companies, but Covid was a major problem at that time and everything was slowing down considerably.

In 2021, I began collaborating as an additional composer with renowned and brilliant Hollywood composer Pinar Toprak (Captain Marvel, Krypton, Stargirl). It has been a blessing from the beginning to meet her. My music can be heard in movies like “Shotgun Wedding” (Lionsgate) by Jason Moore, the TV Series “NFL Thursday Night Football”, “The Lost City” (Paramount Pictures) by Aaron Nee and Adam Nee, and more to be announced soon in 2023.

Lately, in 2022 I worked as an additional composer alongside one of my heroes, Henry Jackman (Jumanji saga, Kingsman, Kong Skull Island) providing additional music for the Disney movie “Strange World”, by Don Hall, Qui Nguyen (Walt Disney). It was one of the most extraordinary experiences of my life, and right after I worked alongside Alex Belcher on the TV series Citadel (Prime) by brothers Anthony Russo and Joe Russo. A new extraordinary adventure is about to start on a massive blockbuster sequel, but I can’t share any single detail yet. I already have other films lined up for the rest of this year after that.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

The idea of becoming a music composer was clear to me from an early age, and I didn’t care what genre I was going to write for, be it classical concerts, film music, opera, because I knew from an early age that I would need to express myself through my own music and language. In my country of birth (Italy), where art in general struggles to find a fair way, especially classical and film music suffer due to lack of funds (and I won’t go any further), the first years of my career were challenging. At 18, I began collaborating with other composers and conductors as a composer, orchestrator, and conductor, but it wasn’t enough for me financially and personally. In order to make a living, I needed to do something more fulfilling and solid. As a result, I decided to pursue a career as a film composer, but I knew I had to move to the USA, the true homeland of film music.

My every move, decision, and sacrifice since then has been driven by a vivid and determined desire to find my purpose. It was my visceral desire to do this that led me to make many sacrifices. Having not done that sooner is the only regret I have. Upon graduating from the Music Conservatory in Italy, I was eager to participate in one of LA’s most important Film Scoring Programs. In spite of my efforts to earn enough money to cover university tuition, I was unable to find a lucrative job in my country. It was a frustrating situation for me. Therefore, after spending years in this attempt, fate made me find another path, which was highly profitable and fast: I attended and won international composition contests, such as the FMF Film Music Festival in Krakow, where I met important Hollywood film music professionals.

In the meantime, I faced a new obstacle: obtaining a working visa before moving to the US. A foreigner has to face this challenge in order to be considered for living and working in America. As soon as I learned what I needed to satisfy in order to receive the O-1 visa, which encompassed many aspects, bullet points, and specific requirements, I devoted one full year to filling in all the required fields (I won’t mention them here). After all those aspects were satisfied, I processed the application with a Los Angeles immigration lawyer, and the O-1 Visa was issued immediately.

Therefore, I moved to Los Angeles (2015) where my real adventure began. To make enough money to survive in LA, I worked on many gigs as an orchestrator and copyist for the first 6-8 months, till when fight after fight, the real chance came in (2016), leading me to one of the best positions I could ever dream of: assistant and additional composer for one of the top composers in LA, Tom Holenborg (aka Junkie XL). My willpower taught me an important lesson: no matter what path, no matter how and no matter when, if you strongly believe in something and are willing to sacrifice every aspect of your life, nothing can break you down.

However, my original desire to write music for any purpose remains. When the opportunity arises, I enjoy new challenges, finding new ways to apply my classical training, and escaping to my classical environment when I can. There is no end to the learning curve. As a composer, I crave and need to write music regardless of the subject matter. Having a high-quality project that is well received by the public is a blessing for me. Theatres, movies, cinemas, video games and concerts are all means of expressing my art, and more importantly, they are meant to evoke emotions in the audience and in myself too. For me, feeling emotions, communicating with people, and conveying what I have inside is the main goal.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

I would call it a mindset shift rather than an unlearned lesson. There is a vast difference between film music and classical music. For young composers just entering the business, it is unclear whether the film music composer is at the service of the directors, producers, and studios. My mentality had to change completely when I began working on my first big movie in LA (The Dark Tower), coming from the classical music concert environment, where music is the only protagonist. However, it wasn’t a hard process, it was a fair learning curve I quickly understood and embraced.

The film composer’s main role is to evaluate the movie, highlight the storyline and increase the emotions, to help, this is the most important scope. It is also important for composers to know when to be quieter and when to be busier with the music, as well as to avoid overloads and overdoing, and even to “create” silence if required. There is no need for the composer to show off, but a variety of skills are definitely the best ally. Providing these aspects are accepted, the film composer should always maintain a constructive dialogue with the filmmakers, always placing it on a level of desire to cooperate to improve the film, that’s the only goal. A composer should, of course, share his/her thoughts and solutions/ideas, as well as bring all his/her knowledge and experience collected during the training and past works, that’s crucial.    

Contact Info:

• Website: http://www.antoniodiiorio.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/antonio.di.iorio_composer/?hl=it
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/antonio.d.iorio.31/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/antoniodiiorio
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@Starbebep/videos
• Other: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm5151112/
• SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/antonio-di-iorio

Image Credits
ASCAP Workshop Alita Battle Angel recording – Mix Console at FOX Newman Scoring Stage Tomb Raider recording – London AIR Studios Budapest Scoring Stage