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Jello Biafra

Brooklyn-based composer and performer Jordan Dykstra specialises in film and concert music. At this years Sundance his latest feature film score can be discovered in the Ukrainian war correspondent and filmmaker Mstyslav Chernov's powerful documentary 20 Days in Mariupol. As the Russian invasion begins, follows a team of Ukrainian journalists trapped in the besieged city of Mariupol who struggle to continue their work documenting the war’s atrocities.

Hi Jordan, thank you for talking with The New Current, how have you been?

Very good, thanks. I just returned back home to Brooklyn from Park City. Time to get to all those emails which have been building up over the past 2 weeks.

Congratulations on having 20 Days in Mariupol premiere at Sundance 2023, do you ever get nervous ahead of a new film being screened?

Thanks! Yes, I always get nervous when seeing a new film in the theatre — or maybe anxious and excited better describe the feeling. I am always so curious to hear the mix in a properly treated theatre with a surround sound (even though every theatre is just so different)! And then there’s the audience’s reaction in real time, that energy is palpable.

What’s that feeling like, sitting in a cinema with an audience and watching them react to your score?

It’s incomparable, but perhaps somewhat akin to seeing live standup comedy? You know, like the way the room’s energy can change the way you experience familiar moments. The energy can feel so vivid at times or, at other movements, completely unexpected (and not always in the most comfortable way) — every screening is so different. At the premiere of 20 Days in Mariupol at the Egyptian Theatre I could sense many people holding back tears, and some were not able to achieve this. When the credits finally rolled the audience began to clap, but hesitantly, I think because they were still processing what they had seen — the contradictory feeling of being stunned but also feeling grateful for the filmmaker’s work. When the director later came up for a Q&A the audience jumped to their feet and gave a long standing ovation, it was incredible.

When do you normally come onboard a film project, is it important for a composer to be there at the very start of a production?

Every project is a bit different but I prefer to be there from the beginning, even at the stage where the film exists only as a script (or an assembly, in the case of a documentary). I prefer to be involved as early as possible so that conceptual elements can be included in the production process and folded into the filming process.

Due to the salient nature and subject of 20 Days in Mariupol did you have any apprehension about how you would create a score that dealt with such powerful and relevant themes?

I am honoured to be a part of such a powerful — and pertinent — project. I feel grateful to the director Mystalov and producers, especially Michelle Miznor, who gave me the opportunity to come on board and fill in the blanks. At a young age I fell in love with Frontline, even at one point stating on Twitter that 50% of all I own should be donated to the organization if I die (I didn’t have a will at the time), so I am honoured to be given the opportunity to help forward the stellar programming that WGBH Frontline offers the American populous. The AP, who the director works for, is also an excellent news source. As far as having apprehension, I was a bit nervous about jumping head first into a project with such intense imagery. I had done it before, especially with my string composing work on It Comes At Night, and there were days I had to murder my way out of my nightmares. It was intense, I knew I would need to switch it up on the next project and focus on something a bit more light-hearted. I know our editor Mizner said that she hadn’t ever cried as much as she did while editing 20 Days and I must acknowledge that it was the same for me; I have never wept as much as I did while scoring 20 Days in Mariupol. You know what, I don’t think I’ve ever wept while scoring before!

What was it about 20 Days in Mariupol that connected with you and inspired you to create the score?

The first thing that drew me into the project was the audaciousness of the edit — I was floored. I had never seen a Frontline episode quite like this. It was bold, courageous, truly harrowing, and unflinching. The episode was an unapologetic document of the Russian invasion and it gave a fascinating account of how news is captured and what these war correspondents go through. It gave an unfiltered sense of the shot-but-unseen footage almost always removed from the public’s eye. Oh, and plus they had temped in a bunch of my chamber music, choosing some of the stranger pieces. The music they were looking for was really noisy and harsh, they wanted the sonic landscape to mimic the visual aesthetics which were a lot of shelled windowless industrial buildings so I tried to bring that in the horror-like score. You know, the feeling that war is impending and knocking at your door. It’s really a distressing watch, as you might imagine, but that allowed me to implore some of my favourite microtonal and noise music techniques.

How important is the creative collaborative relationship between a composer and your director?

The relationship between the director and myself is of utmost importance. If we can’t see eye to eye – or if we can’t imagine how we might see eye to eye in the process going forward – it's impossible, or very unlikely, that we can find our way forward.