Composer Bear McCreary Talks The Walking Dead

Earlier today, Walking Dead composer Bear McCreary participated in an AMA on Reddit. As part of answering fan questions, he share several interesting facts about the music of The Walking Dead. Here are some of the Walking Dead related highlights from his discussion.As far as the type of composing work he does for Walking Dead, Bear McCreary explained, “TWD is a mixture of the traditional and the bizarre. We use a small string orchestra (which creates that repeating pattern you hear leading into each Main Title sequence). But, I use distorted bluegrass instruments for the ambient and terrifying sounds. Most of the time that a zombie is on screen, the sound you’re hearing is a distorted electric banjo!”In regards to if he used sounds he had heard before on The Walking Dead, McCreary said, “There are tons of ‘go-to’ scary sounds in film scoring. Those were the first things we eliminated when Frank Darabont and I started talking about the score for the show. I go out of my way to not fall back on those old tropes, because we’re so familiar with them. They’re not effecetive anymore.”When asked if he will ever get a cameo as a Walker, McCreary replied, “I’ve already pitched this idea to Greg Nicotero. I want to be a Walker ACCORDION PLAYER. As soon as the right script comes along, we’re gonna do it!”Two of the most emotional scenes to ever air on The Walking Dead were the barn scene in the Season 2 Finale and Lori’s scene in “The Killer Within.” When asked to compare the music between the two scenes, McCreary answered, “NO SPOILERS, but they were both immensely challenging. ‘Killer Within’ took me a week. Not to score the whole episode… just that one scene. And it really depressed me. I had trouble sleeping. It was not fun. Totally worthwhile in the end, but the experience was very unpleasant.”