A New Type Of Film Music Company

There have been many fights and make-ups in the marriage of film and music.

Many independent and breaking artists have turned to film and television placements as a new source of revenue in the sales-starved music industry.

There’s the envied roles that music supervisors play, picking and licensing songs for films, which is revealed in the behind-the-scenes story penned for our pages by the Santa Monica, California-based supervisor G. Marc Roswell on his work for the film The Great Debaters.

On Sunday, The New York Times reported on a new model for film music. But unlike so many updates in the music space these days, the news from Hollywood seems quite positive.

In the new twist, an investment company called Cutting Edge, based in London, bought the music for the recent Oscar-nominated film, The King’s Speech, before the film finished production. Cutting Edge was able to put up money – which the film’s producers could not – in order to secure a higher caliber of music.

Cutting Edge’s founder, Phillip Moross, tells the Times that he thinks the investment model he’s been spearheading will become more commonplace in the film industry.

According to the newspaper, a company like Cutting Edge may “recruit a music supervisor, who suggests what songs to include and helps clear the rights, and a composer who writes the score. It may also provide recording studio services, operate its own record label, administer publishing rights and distribute the music in other forms after a film is released.”