'CSI' Music Aims To Be 'Organic'

CSI: Crime Scene Investigation's audio wizards have a strong belief that the show's music must not be high-tech for high-tech's sake — it must flow from the atmosphere of the scene.

"We take a very organic approach to music," music supervisor Jason Alexander told Heather Johnson at Audio Media Online. "We solve crimes through science. That involves technical machines, the processing of DNA and very basic chemical processes. So it's not always high-tech. Sometimes we take a low-fi approach to the music and a high-tech approach to the scene [or vice versa]. If everything flowed the same way it would probably be too acute. That's why we love the word organic — it just feels right for us."

While CSI often uses contemporary songs, composer John M. Keane also devises approximately 30 minutes of original music for each episode. "One of the most rewarding things about working on CSI is its incredible detail to sound and music," Keane said. "There's a sound for everything. There's a feature approach to the show, which is quite unique to television in terms of creating thematic material throughout an episode."

Keane has even composed a theme for CSI's leading man, Gil Grissom, and tries to create individual styles for different types of scenes. "Generally in an autopsy scene there will be something under the dialogue that's mysterious, creepy, or ominous," he said. "Then there are the rhythmic elements of a crime scene, and montage scenes where there are rhythmic elements and other crazy stuff going on."

But the music maestro is never complacent about letting the music write itself. "In television there's a lot of recycling going on, but this is not the show to do that in," Keane said.

The complete interview, in which Keane also talked in detail about the instruments he uses, can be found at Audio Media Online. Thanks to Elyse's CSI Site for this!

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