Scoring THE SIMPSONS

By: Randall D. Larson
Date: Wednesday, November 10, 1999

You know when you look up into a blue sunny sky, punctuated by puffy, scattered white clouds, and rather than marveling at the beauty of creation all you can do is murmur, singingly, 'The Simmmp-soonnnnssss!' that Matt Groening's creation has indeed become a cultural icon. You also know that the music for THE SIMPSONS goes hand in hand with its zany depiction of the world's most functional dysfunctional family. For every 'd'oh!' from Homer, every 'hmmmmm' from Marge, and every 'don't have a cow, man' from Bart, there is a treasure trove of musical accompaniment that contributes essentially to the success of the cartoon series.

That music is the responsibility of Alf Clausen, a mild mannered and intrinsically friendly fellow who has crafted the music of THE SIMPSONS almost from its premiere. While composer Danny Elfman, of Oingo Boingo and BEETLEJUICE and BATMAN and MEN IN BLACK fame, wrote the show's theme music, Clausen provides each episode's songs and instrumental underscoremusic vital to the success of THE SIMPSONS, and oftentimes just as funny.

The musical philosophy of THE SIMPSONS has always been to treat it as seriously as possible and avoid 'mickey-mouse' type cartoon music. The musical approach has always been symphonic as well, avoiding an overuse of electronics and synthesizers. According to SIMPSONS creator Matt Groening, using an acoustic orchestra to score the show smoothes out the animation, which can be occasionally rough due to the short amount of turnaround time. 'He also feels that an acoustic score gives the series more class and substance. I was given a directive when I started the series that THE SIMPSONS is not a cartoon, but a drama where the characters are drawn, and that the emotional content of the score should be focused in the direction of a drama.'

That philosophy has served Clausen well through the nine seasons he's been scoring the series. Through a myriad of short cuesas many as 52 per episodeoften varying wildly in style within and between episodes, Clausen has crafted an effective and appropriate musical soundscape for the show. Those 52 cues were composed for Treehouse of Horror VIIIthe 8th annual Halloween episode, where Clausen gets to pull out all the stops and create some truly impressionable musicalbeit in tiny snippets averaging 10-15 seconds each. The 8th season show matched Clausen's previous record of 52-cues for a previous Halloween episode.

Clausen, who grew up in North Dakota, moved to Los Angeles in 1967, where he worked as a copyist, arranger, teacher, and ghostwriter for nightclub acts and commercial jingles. He eventually found work in television, composing music for shows like WIZARDS AND WARRIORS, LIME STREET, FAME, and appropriately - ALF. He was musical director for THE DONNY AND MARIE SHOW and THE MARY TYLER MOORE VARIETY SHOW and gained acclaim for his music for the MOONLIGHTING TV series. After starting on THE SIMPSONS, he went on to score THE CRITIC, several television movies, and last summer's comedy feature, HALF BAKED. And he's come through it relatively unscathed.


Composing music in 10-second bursts can be challenging. 'Other than keeping up with the schedule, mentally and physically, the greatest composing challenge has been to try and make some kind of musical sense out of the cues when I have only a few seconds to make a musical statement,' Clausen says. 'We have a joke on the scoring stage that I can make you feel five ways in thirteen seconds! We say it in jest, but the reality of the situation is that I am required to do just that quite often. It is definitely a challenge.'

Each episode's score is recorded by an orchestra of about 35 players. There are occasional exceptions when unusual instruments are needed for certain cues. 'We add players from time to time when a special stylistic sound is called for, such as harmonica, accordion, additional guitars, etc.,' says Clausen. 'The 'Cape Feare' episode called for a Bernard Herrmann-style score, so I added extra French horns, trombones, tuba, and percussion. We also add singers when we have vocals to record.'

That can be quite often, as many episodes contain songs, either in parody (such as the Shary Bobbins episode or as a stand-alone set piece (such as 'The Spring In Springfield' from 'Bart After Dark'). 'I try to make my original songs musical while at the same time just difficult enough so that the cast members will sing up to their capabilities without throwing me out of the room for writing such difficult stuff!' Clausen says. 'The cast members are all great, and I think that they have probably discovered over the years that they can sing better than they ever thought they could. I'm proud of them! They rise to the occasion beautifully, and I often write them some very challenging songs.'

For the most part, Clausen scores to a completed video each week, except of course during the summer months between seasons. Occasionally, however, he has to rely on less complete material. 'There are cases when the episode contains animatics (pencil renderings of the color scenes) or temporary shots that will be replaced with retakes before the air date,' Clausen says. 'In these instances, the overall timings usually remain the same, so they do not present a big problem for me with respect to last-minute scoring changes.'

Scoring comedy is an art in itself. The composer has to run the fine line and know when to emphasize the comedic aspects of a situation and when to play it straight. For the most part, Clausen plays it straight. 'A bandleader friend of mine once told me, 'You can't vaudeville vaudeville,'' Clausen says. 'What he meant was that a comedic situation becomes much more absurd if it is accompanied by appropriately serious music which is true to that situation.' That philosophy has also served Clausen well with the scoring of THE SIMPSONS. 'If a character finds himself in a particular situation, my musical philosophy has been to score the scene as if the situation is really happening to the character, no matter how absurd it might seem. This helps pull the audience in to the reality of the situation. Then, boom! The joke happens, and becomes all the funnier because the audience has been musically led to believe the situation is for real.'

THE SIMPSONS may well be the most eclectically scored show on television, which often requires a degree of research to create such wildly divergent music. 'If there are references with which I'm not familiar, one of the production assistants finds the pertinent CDs for me and puts together a videotape with clips from the references needed,' Clausen says. 'I have about 20 minutes each week to study those CD and videotape selections and distill the needed elements from them. I then have to make very quick decisions about what the proper melodic, harmonic, rhythmic, and orchestral elements are in each cue to give the 'viewers-on-the-street' the feeling that they are listening to the score from, let's say, WATERWORLD, even though we are not using the music from that film. All of this must be done while there are about 30 more cues left to be composed, and the clock never stops ticking!'

Other times, actual musical cues are used for satirical purposessuch as the quotation from Elmer Bernstein's GREAT ESCAPE theme used during Maggie's escape from nursery school in 'A Streetcar Named Marge.' This requires that the musical quote be licensed from its copyright holderusually the studio publishing house that owns it. 'Moments like these are often written in as part of the script, so the FOX music licensing department has months to deal with the negotiations,' says Clausen. 'Other times, the decision to use a piece of music happens in the music spotting session [when composer and producer determine where music is needed during each episode in production], which gives the licensing department a major headache with only four or five days to obtain the clearance before the scoring session.

The series main theme was composed by Danny Elfman, former Oingo Boingo founding member and notable film composer of BEETLEJUICE, BATMAN, MARS ATTACKS, MEN IN BLACK, and others. While the theme itself rarely intervenes in the midst of an episode score, Clausen frequently will adapt it in various guises over the end titles of a given episode. Over the years, Clausen has created satirical version of the themea DRAGNET-style versions, an Aussie versions (heavy on the didgideroo), an ADDAMS FAMILY version (snap! snap!), even a martial JFK version. 'The producers, music editor, and I collaborate on which episodes would be best suited to these types of variations,' Clausen says. 'We always try to tailor the End Credit variation to the running story theme of the episode. The ADDAMS FAMILY homage was for a Halloween episode, for example.'

Clausen has not composed themes for Simpson family membersno 'Lisa Theme' or 'Bart Theme,' for examplebut there are recurring motifs associated with Mr. Burns, Krusty the Clown, and Sideshow Bob. 'I have intentionally stayed away from composing individual character themes and have focused instead on giving each story its own theme and its own thematic development whenever possible. That approach helps to give each story its own special identification, more like individual mini-movies.'

Despite having scored the show for so long, Clausen still finds it extremely rewarding and enjoyable. 'My challenge is to keep it fresh and interesting, musically,' he says. 'The series has burned through about four sets of writers in nine seasons, but I'm still here. Composing all of the original songs for the series has kept the creative juices flowing for me. And let's face itTHE SIMPSONS is still funny after all those years!'

The series and its music have also hit a positive public chord. The release in 1997 of MUSIC IN THE KEY OF SPRINGFIELD, a CD containing music, dialog, and songs from various episodes, was picked as one of the top CDs of the year by the Wall Street Journal's year-end 'Rock & Roll Year In Review.' Clausen wasn't involved with the recent The Yellow Album song CD, but a second SIMPSONS songs-n-score CD is said to be underway. 'It has been very rewarding to get such positive feedback from the public at large about the musical direction of the series and the CD,' Clausen says. 'I have been fortunate to have scored four successful television series in 12 years. THE SIMPSONS, however, is the first series that has had such a worldwide mass acceptance on such an amazingly broad level. It truly has become an icon of American pop culture, and to be part of the creative team on such a piece of television history is quite an honor.'

As the series races toward a tenth season, Clausen looks forward to additional musical opportunities. 'The joy about an animated series is that the family doesn't have to age, so the sky is the limit on story ideas from the writers,' Clausen says. 'I look forward to finding out what the next wacky piece of business will be. On the music side, with any luck, maybe the number of players in my orchestra will increase.' That would be a switch for television, known for increasingly limited musical budgets. 'We have had the luck of blazing a few trails with this show, musically, so it's not out of the question.'