Saturday, September 12, 2015

The Music Team Behind Netflix’s ‘Narcos’ Series

Narcos
Wagner Moura as Pablo Escobar in the Netflix Original Series Narcos. (Daniel Daza/Netflix)
 
Billboard recently spoke with the music team behind Netflix’s new Narcos show. The series tells the story of Colombia’s most infamous drug lord, Pablo Escobar.
 
Brazilian composers Pedro Bromfman and Rodrigo Amarante gave plenty of insight about their involvement, including their creative approach, which instruments they used, what it’s like writing for a streaming series.
 
“Tuyo,” the theme song for the show, debuted this week at number 13 and number six on Billboard’s Latin Digital Songs and Latin Pop Digital Songs, respectively.
 
Rodrigo on composing the theme song:
“The way the lyrics are written and the way the production sounds is all about Pablo’s transition from childhood to manhood, which is what defines him. I wanted to deliver something romantic and deceivingly generous but if you listen to the lyrics you see that there’s a narcissistic point of view. All of those men were all children at one point, so in my head the song gives the viewer a bit of context, rather than just saying, ‘Oh, these guys are animals.’ I think there’s more to it.”
 
Pedro on which instruments he used:
“In South America, north of Argentina, they have the charango, and the ronroco, which is a deeper, bassier charango. I played a lot of those. We also used a lot of accordion and some harmonicas. I had this splash of inspiration from Sergio Leone westerns with Ennio Morricone scores. There are some other instruments that are completely foreign to Colombia. There’s one called the hang from Switzerland, which has this deep, haunting, metallic sound that I use in a few scenes. I always like to use the traditional instruments but I also bring in some foreign sounds. I played a lot of the flutes from Colombia and Peru, then I brought them into the computer and reversed them. It creates this ambience that you don’t really know came from a flute originally. It’s a modern, original kind of score.”
 

 
Related: Timbaland Talks Producing Music for ‘Empire’ TV Show and Upcoming Album

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