Lost Ollie Exclusive: Scot Stafford Tells Us About Creating The Soundscape For Netflix’s Surprise Gem

Scot Stafford

If you haven’t yet, go right now to Netflix and watch Lost OllieI guarantee it will make your top 10 list by the end of the year, just like it’s gonna make a lot of ours. At any rate, we had the incredible opportunity to interview Pollen Music Group– the group behind the original score, orchestration, and Atmos music mix of the Netflix film, Lost Ollie.

The original score was composed by Scot Stafford, orchestrated by Stephen Spies, performed by the Budapest Symphony Orchestra, and mixed in Atmos by JJ Wiesler at Pollen’s stage in San Francisco, CA.

Scot Stafford is a composer, sound supervisor, and the founder and creative director for Pollen Music Group. He’s won multiple awards and received many accolades for his work, including a nomination for a 2019 Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Sound Mixing for an Animated Program for Crow: The Legend. He is best known for his original music for animated projects, including Trash Truck, Sonaria, and Lost Ollie.

The four-part limited television series, which recently premiered on Netflix stars Jonathan Groff, Tim Blake Nelson, and Mary J. Blige. Set in Kentucky, series creator Shannon Tindle’s home, and based on the 2016 children’s book Ollie’s Odyssey, Lost Ollie is a live-action/computer-animated story that follows a patchwork rabbit focused on reuniting with his best friend, Billy.  Using the story’s Kentucky roots and dark fantasy inspiration, Pollen’s Scot worked to create a score that drew from a deep well of Appalachian folk music to build emotive volume. The score’s composition enhances and emotionally charges Ollie’s, the series’ titular character, epic quest to find his best friend – the young boy he desperately loves.

We had a chance to talk with Scot Stafford about his extensive career, working on Lost Ollie, and other projects they’ve worked on. We also threw in a curve ball question that had been on my mind a lot lately. Enjoy!

John Schwarz: When Pollen Music Group takes ANY project on, what are some of the key identifiers you are looking for in said project and what was it in Lost Ollie that made the project appealing?

Scot Stafford: I try to find projects that are full of heart and require every part of my brain.  When it also occupies four of our team at Pollen — me, my partner and Atmos music mixer JJ Wiesler, our executive producer Shannon Ryan, and our phenom fiddler, orchestrator and composer Stephen Spies — it’s a huge plus.  Lost Ollie hit every button.  My friendship with creator Shannon Tindle and my love of Appalachian music, which was written into the script, made it very personal.

What was some of the direction brought in by Shannon Tindle and the Lost Ollie producers, and what was it like trying to coincide different visions that eventually came to play?

Shannon’s first musical direction was, “I want it to sound like an Appalachian Lord of the Rings.” I’d just read Ollie’s Odyssey; I’ve been an avid Tolkien fan since I was twelve; and it just made sense and I couldn’t wait to jump in.  The idea that the inner lives of a kid in rural Kentucky can be so epic and powerful really drew me in.  From then on it was a dream, working with Shannon and Peter [Ramsey].  We had each other’s backs, and those guys were totally on the same page.  It never felt like different visions, which is incredible.

Lost Ollie may seem like a kids friendly franchise at first, but clearly by episode three it gets dark, what was it like trying to balance the tone of the series?

Oh, Ollie gets dark, alright.  But the opening montage of episode one doesn’t hold back, either.  I worked closely with the sound designer, Jamey Scott, and we sat in on each others’ spotting sessions with Peter and Shannon.  In the first scene of the first episode, Shannon wanted to establish that these characters, despite being stuffed animals, felt real pain.  That would play out in both sound and music.  Jamey and I wanted to be sure to get the exact amount right from the get-go, and we found that it was very surprisingly real, very painful pain.  I don’t think I’d ever seen that in a film with stuffed animals before.  By episode three, we still had the occasional, “is this okay?” conversation.  Is it okay to be this dark?  The only time I remember crossing the line was when a very violent scene had very realistic sound design.  It was the only time I remember anyone saying, “okay, yeesh, that’s too much.”  And we all agreed.

Are there stylistic differences in producing music for kids projects versus adult-skewing projects or is the sound of a soundtrack more indicative of the project regardless of the intended age group? 

Nearly always.  But not with Lost Ollie!  You know, it reminds me of being about five years old and tagging along with my older brother’s birthday party to watch a double feature of Watership Down and Ralph Bakshi’s Lord of the Rings.  They were both extremely dark, violent, and emotionally intense.  And we all LOVED them.  Both of those stayed with me for years.  I remember trying to find that same feeling from other books or animated movies, and for years, it just never came back, until I read both of those books in 7th grade.  I kept reminding myself that the childhood we remember when we tell kids stories is just not childhood as it happened.  Childhood could be so rough.  Having stories that speak to that is important, I think.

Pollen Music has been lucky enough to work with iconic franchises like The Simpsons, the Gorillaz, and the range of sonic types is very evident, is that a pathos that the company lives by?

I’ve always been a chameleon and always will be.  I adore being subsumed and disappearing into a story.  The music and sound are two important elements of world creation.  There’s nothing better than that, and there’s nothing worse than someone’s identity or ego pulling us out of it.  That’s my ethos and pathos, in a nutshell.  

A lot of knowledge about producing music for television, I know for a lot of people, comes from one Charlie Sheen portraying the role of a “jingle” writer in Two and a Half Men that only needs a piano to get his job right. Can you shed light on this in, how much of this take is true versus false? 

I’ve only watched half an episode, but the trope of the jingle writer at the piano has been disappearing steadily for a few decades now.  Not just the role, but the entire idea of the “jingle.”  Catchy leitmotifs disappeared in favor of a mood, and only started coming back ironically about 10 years ago, and with McDonald’s.  Which isn’t ironic, but it is really cynical.  But no, pianos aren’t much involved, as composers aren’t really writing melodies and chords, and they aren’t sharing their ideas at the piano.  Everything is software now, and clients need to hear the rough draft sound like the final.  Orchestrated, produced, mixed, etc.

AI-produced content is on the rise, be it in voice-acting, script-writing, illustration, and yes, music. Do you embrace new web3 technologies like this having worked on XR projects in the past and is there a place for this tech in music production?

That’s the 50,000 dogecoin question. What’s a little worrying is that composers are feeding the AI with every composition they deliver to a tech giant that is machine learning how to automate everything.  In the short term, AI music royally sucks or is tweaked to sound good by, well, artists.  In the long term, it will eventually sound good.  Humans are most gifted at engineering their own demise.  Yay?  

In terms of tools for the composer, I really love new design and new interfaces and new sounds.  I was just getting really nostalgic about an old piece of software that dominated DIY music for about 5 years, Propellerheads Reason.  My god that was just so fun and powerful, and really felt new at the time.  Perhaps your readers can suggest something similar happening in XR.  I’ve seen a lot of concepts, nothing mindblowing yet.  

Are there new projects coming soon that Pollen Music is allowed to talk about that you are excited to sink your teeth into?

So many new projects, but I can’t talk about them.  A big CG animated feature; and we’re making prototypes for a bunch of neural interactive experiences for a well known band… ugh.  NDA’s, dammit!

Lost Ollie is streaming on Netflix now, read our review here.