We heard from our friend Dee Kelly, a TV personality, vocalist, certified Feng Shui expert and design consultant (wellnessdecor.com) regarding a TV theme for a show she was pitching to one of the cable channels.
The theme song, “The House Is You,” was written by Tom Costello who arranged and recorded a demo of the song, with Dee singing.
The channel in question had a demographic profile somewhat different than that suggested by the arrangement of the theme on the demo, and Dee wanted to ensure that the product fit the customer.
Here’s our comment note on delivering our demo:
There are a lot of good things about Tom’s arrangement – a homey, classy vibe with a little sophistication – so I kinda went that way.
I thought the build into the second chorus was a little overdone, a little too anthemic-stadium-rock-y, so I went with strings and lead guitar for the other instruments that come in.
Here’s the before:
We started with a transcription of the track, put it into Finale notation, then brought the midi and stems into Pro Tools for the vocal recording and mix at John Kilgore Sound and Recording in the Film Center Building, NYC.
Here’s what we did:
