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Podcast Notes: Broken Record - Ludwig Göransson
Episode Overview Podcast Title: Broken Record Episode Title: Ludwig Göransson Hosts: Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam, Justin Richmond Guest: Ludwig Göransson Release Date: [Not specified in transcript] Produced by: Pushkin Industries in partnership with iHeartMedia
Episode Description In this episode, Justin Richmond interviews Ludwig Göransson, an acclaimed film composer known for his unique contributions to cinema. They discuss his journey from Sweden to Hollywood, his collaborative work with director Christopher Nolan on films like *Tenet* and *Oppenheimer*, and his innovative scoring methods.
Key Discussion Points
Introduction to Ludwig Göransson
- Göransson is a prominent film composer who emigrated from Sweden to Los Angeles in 2007.
- His notable works include scores for major films such as *Black Panther*, which won him an Academy Award for Best Original Score, and *Oppenheimer*.
- He has collaborated closely with director Ryan Coogler and has contributed to several acclaimed projects over the years.
Early Influences and Training
- Göransson's rigorous musical training in Sweden prepared him for complex film scoring.
- He began his career in television, overseeing music for shows like *Community* and *The Mandalorian*.
Scoring *Oppenheimer*
- The project began after Göransson and Nolan's successful collaboration on *Tenet*.
- Göransson's approach involved conversations with Nolan to deeply understand the film's character, specifically the portrayal of J. Robert Oppenheimer.
- He used the violin to embody Oppenheimer's personality, working closely with his wife, who is an accomplished violinist.
The Creative Process
- Göransson emphasizes the importance of understanding a director's vision when composing music.
- He describes a significant moment in the film where silence is used effectively during the Trinity test, highlighting the emotional weight of the score.
- The idea of using tempo changes mathematically was discussed; Göransson implemented 21 tempo changes in certain pieces to reflect the film's narrative.
Thematic Elements
- Göransson created distinct themes for key characters, including Oppenheimer and his wife, Kitty.
- The music was designed to resonate emotionally with the audience, capturing the complexity of Oppenheimer's character and the narrative arc of the film.
Challenges and Reflections
- Ludwig reflects on the challenges of balancing personal storytelling with the overarching themes of destruction and morality present in *Oppenheimer*.
- He discusses the importance of feeling connected to the characters and narrative while composing, aiming to immerse the audience in their experiences.
Future Projects
- Göransson hinted at upcoming projects while expressing a desire to focus on his own music and creative endeavors.
- He is working on a personal album, mentioning a psychedelic, quirky sound influenced by his diverse musical background.
Key Takeaways
- Ludwig Göransson’s work is characterized by a deep understanding of narrative and character, utilizing his musical training to enhance storytelling in film.
- His collaborative process with directors, particularly Nolan, plays a crucial role in how he approaches composing.
- The integration of innovative techniques, such as tempo changes and thematic development, reflects a sophisticated understanding of music and its impact on film.
Conclusion
- The episode showcases Göransson’s journey and creative philosophy, offering insights into the complex world of film scoring and the collaborative nature of the film industry.
Additional Resources
- Listen to a Playlist of Ludwig Göransson's Music: [Spotify Playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7MopVJALYe9t5SxMxNnJkD?si=c40c938adf3a4587)
- Follow Us on Twitter: [Broken Record](https://twitter.com/BrokenRecord)
Production Credits: Produced and edited by Leah Rose Marketing help from Eric Sandler and Jordan McMillan
Engineer
Ben Toleday Theme music by Kenny Beats
For more episodes and insights, consider subscribing to Pushkin Plus for exclusive content.
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:06Pushkin. This is an iHeart Podcast. In today's super competitive business environment, the edge goes to those who push harder, move faster, and level up every tool in their arsenal. T-Mobile knows all about that. They're now the best network, according to the experts at Ooclas Speedtest. And they're using that network to launch Supermobile, the first and only business plan to combine intelligent performance, built-in security, and seamless satellite coverage. That's your business, Supercharged. Learn more at supermobile.com. Seamless coverage with compatible devices in most outdoor areas in the U.S.
0:48where you can see the sky. Best network based on analysis by Ukla of Speedtest Intelligence Data 1H 2025. Every great music conversation goes beyond the surface. The influence that shaped an artist's sound. The moment that changed their creative direction. The story behind the story that fans never hear. Claude helps you discover those deeper connections. Upload interviews, liner notes, or music journalism, and Claude reveals patterns across an artist's entire journey, showing how influences become innovations. Whether you're a music journalist, passionate fan, or someone who loves understanding creative processes, Claude matches your curiosity about what really drives great artists.
1:29Try Claude for free at Claude.ai slash brokenrecord. Lexus is a company that believes in the importance of setting a standard, which I can appreciate as someone who holds themselves to lofty if not ridiculous standards, especially with the car I drive. The standard Lexus has set for themselves is to experience amazing. Lexus measures success by the feeling and emotions evoked in a driver, like exhilaration and joy. Amazing can only be achieved by knowing people on a deeper level. The standard of amazing results in a feeling in drivers that their car was built in anticipation of them. Machines that make you feel more human.
2:06Because a car that doesn't make you feel something is a car that stops short of amazing. Experience amazing at your Lexus dealer. Ludwig Gorenson is without a doubt one of the most accomplished and distinctive film composers of the 21st century. In 2020, after having worked on Tenet together, acclaimed director Christopher Nolan hired Gorenson again to score what has become one of the biggest movies of 2023, Oppenheimer. Ludwig, who emigrated to Los Angeles from his native Sweden in 2007, has racked up dozens of writing, producing, and scoring credits. He started out working in TV and oversaw music on hit shows like Community, New Girl, and The Mandalorian.
2:49He eventually started scoring films with his old college friend, Ryan Coogler. Ludwig composed music for all of Ryan's hit movies, including Fruitvale Station, the Creed series, and both Black Panther films, the first of which won him the Academy Award for Best Original Score in 2019. On today's episode, I talk to Ludwig Gorenson about his incredible body of work as a composer and producer. He explains how his rigorous musical training in Sweden prepared him to write the complex sections of Oppenheimer's score. Ludwig also plays some of the more moving sections of the score for us in an effort to show us how he came up with one of the best soundtracks of the year.
3:30This is Broken Record, liner notes for the digital age. I'm Justin Richman. Here's my conversation with Ludwig Goranson. Congratulations, I should say, on the success of Oppenheimer and also like just the reception to the music has been, it's been incredible. I'll say I always go into movies trying to know nothing. So if I hear Christopher Nolan's been on a movie about Robert Oppenheimer and Robert Downey Jr.'s in it and Cillian Murphy, I'm like, great. That's as much as I want to know. And as I was going through it, this music is incredible. So as soon as I got out, I went to pull it up so I could listen to it on the drive home.
4:11I was like, oh, fuck. I had no idea it was you who was doing the music. Yeah. This is so good, man. Thank you. When did the project come to you? It came to me about right as Chris had finished writing the script. And we had done a movie before called Tenet. Yeah. And that was an incredible experience. Obviously, I've been well aware of Chris' movies and Chris' films and the music, the way he uses music in his storytelling and incredible scores by Hans Zimmer and David Julian and the things that they did on Batman. and he had a huge influence in, I think, every film composer's life. It also transcended just film composers.
4:53It changed films, I think, and the sound of film. What did you notice about it? Before you started working with them, what had you noticed about it? Well, how much front and center the music is in his films and how much they're driving the story and how important it is to the energy and to the tempo and the feel of his films. And it's like his own character. And that's something, you know, when you're getting started in this career trying to write music for a film, you know, and you go to the theater and it's not every time you go see a movie and you really hear the music. Yeah. You know, and I think for with Chris Films, that's, you go to see his films and it's a real experience.
5:36Yeah, it's interesting. You know, it's like, it's not often you go to the movies and you feel like the score is so prominent. Like if the music is prominent, it's often a needle drop. And that feels like the song, you know, the NWA song or the Rolling Stone song that you're hearing that you already have an emotional attachment to. That becomes a character in the movie. But it is very rare in modern cinema to feel so attached to film music as much as you do when you go to see a Christopher Nolan movie. How conscious are you of that while you're writing the score for a Christopher Nolan movie? I'm not thinking about when I'm in the moment and writing the music, I'm thinking about the vision of the director.
6:18What is he or she imagining? What's the things that I can't see in the script? What are the things that I can't see when I see the film for the first time? and sometimes I even want the director to talk to me like I'm an actor or tell me as much as possible about this film, having as many conversations about the script. And as much input as I can get about what their vision is, the more helpful it's going to be for me to create the world of music and the sound world for the film. So when Christopher Nolan reached out with the Oppenheimer script, what was the message to you? Well, first, he didn't say anything, so I didn't even know what it was about when I sat down to read it.
6:59Just gave it to you or sent it to you? No, no, no. I go to his office and read it because they don't give out the scripts. You have no clue at all. No, so I go there. I'm obviously super excited, and I sit down in the room, and I'm in it for a three-and-a-half-hour journey. It was extremely exhilarating. I remember reading the script for the first time. It was so capturing, just being in his life, like seeing the world through his eyes and feeling what he was feeling in those moments. Like everything was written from the first person perspective. So it was an incredible emotional experience reading it for the first time.
7:36At what point do you start allowing yourself to think about music in relation to the script as you're reading that? Well, I'm starting immediately. Thinking about the possibilities and where to go. And I also know that obviously this is my second film with Chris, and know that he's open for any ideas. And then shortly after I read the script, we have a conversation. And the only direction he gave me was that he was interested in, he was very interested in seeing how we could have the violin portray the personality of Oppenheimer. Interesting. So what do you do with that? So, and also Chris knows that my wife Serena Gorenson is a very accomplished violinist.
8:21And we were fortunate that he wanted to take that route because that comes very handy to have a wife that's also a violinist. And we were able to experiment long hours in the studio with things that kind of, after a while, drive me, drive both of us a little crazy. just kind of try to make the violin sound in ways that I haven't heard before and try to manipulate it with audio and sound effects and turning it around. But a lot of the experimentation also came from the conversation I had with Chris in terms of how we can go from, you know, Oppenheimer is very neurotic. But there's also scenes where he's incredibly, you know, confident.
9:05and we wanted to go from something at times very beautiful and confident to something completely neurotic and horrifying. And how can we go between those feelings with a split of a second on the violin with just a performance of a vibrato or doing a microtonal glissando up and down, you know? On first viewing, one of the things that struck me was the decision that I loved for essentially the climax of the movie, which is the testing at Trinity for it just to go silent. Yeah. Blank. Yeah. Was that in the script from the beginning? Yeah, no, that's what's, you know, so many things are in the script.
9:46Like I felt when I watched, when we finished the movie and it was like, it was almost like reading the script again. I mean, it's, the foot stomps are in the script, the parts of silence in the script, everything. I feel like he has probably tempo and music in his mind while he's writing these movies. so that was a violin the first explorations yeah so the violin i was we were we were recording long hours here in my studio and i was doing half like very long kind of glissandos trying to make sounds like almost like air raid sirens but after a while i knew that the most important thing to get right from the beginning was the emotional core of the story and it's easy sometimes when you start working on a project and you start just messing around with production and sounds and like you're trying to you can hide things behind cool sounds or behind effects and sounds and i feel like you tend to do a lot of that when you write on on the computer because you use technology and and and the way you see music on the computer is is is very horizontal and vertical so for me it was important to get the emotional core right and lately it's mostly the last couple years i feel like stepping away from the computer is is is helping me with feeling more creative will you ever just sit down with some some staff paper yeah i mean sitting by the piano writing with staff paper or sitting by the roads or picking up the guitar or whatever.
11:26I mean, I'm not an expert on all instruments, but I can cheat on a few. So a lot of these themes were actually written on the piano. And I remember the specific Oppenheimer theme came about after we recorded hours of A-Rage sirens. and we were kind of going crazy. And I just sat down on the piano and just played this bass melody. Super simple bass line. Do you mind showing me? Yeah. That's Mike. Yeah. It started like this.
12:20I put that in like low cellos, low bass and cellos in a slow tempo.
12:33and then I added this melody
13:07I think counter-mobility.
13:36it's really stunning gosh and then right after i wrote that on on the piano serena i asked serena to play it and the way she performed it was just like it's incredible beautiful intimate performance with almost no vibrato, very fragile, which was perfect. Yeah. And I sent that to Chris and then he called me back like 20 minutes later and I was like, this is it. You know, this is Open Emmer's theme. Wow. And did you think of it as the theme or were you just thinking of it as you could? No, I'm dead, yeah. I thought, I knew it was kind of special, you know. That's amazing. Yeah. And did you, at this point, again, you don't have the, you've read the script.
14:17Did you have it yet? I read the script in the head in my head. But no, nothing at home, nothing to reference as you get back. They hadn't shot the film, but something that's really cool that Chris Nolan does is he brings people in very early, he brings me in very early in the process. So while he's having tests, you know, with visual effects and with also costume tests, and he invites me in to see the screenings of those tests at IMAX theater. And I'm sitting there in IMAX theater, you know watching these incredible visual effects by that he worked on with Andrew Jackson and some incredible experiments that I remember at the time was I felt almost like I was dreaming uh when I was sitting in that room it's a black dark theater and seeing these kind of fluorescent lights like swirling around you spinning faster and faster and faster and then it's cutting into I see fire coming out.
15:14And it's like, just feel very lucky. It's like, you know, go on a Monday morning and it's like, watch this in a theater and then come out of there. It's like a tremendous inspiration to like, some of that things that I saw really inspired me to help me to realize what I wanted the music to sound like. Like that sense of energy that I saw on screen. It's incredible that he had, essentially already had the theme locked in before shooting. Like that gives it almost like, I mean, as you say, it's all there in the script, but the music does add an extra emotional element. I'm sure that must have helped to some degree the emotional contents of what was on camera.
15:54Yeah. No, I... It maybe wasn't as black and white where it was like, this is his theme, but I think we both knew that it was special because we don't want to jinx anything. You don't want to like... Because you never really know if it's going to work until you actually sit down with... Lay it in. Lay it in. with the edit and that's when you really can but but i feel like i mean i've done two films with chris and so far we've been pretty good at trajectoring the sound and the feeling of the of the music before do you think about it thematically i mean because there's two things happening here there's like there's really kind of quiet personal story and then it's almost like the second the co-star is a nuclear bomb you know or atomic bomb which is insane like how do you balance those two things yeah no it was it was very uh it was a really tough movie to to write the music for especially because it is such a personal journey the the feelings that you need to put the audience inside of him like the audience shouldn't sit in the theater judging him they should be there on his journey feeling what he feels and that so that was that's what the music needs to do and the only way to do that is kind of to put i need to put myself into his shoes too and some of it is some of those feelings of like sadness and loneliness and and emptiness and i kind of have them searching for something how to kind of have the movie stars not the music stars that was a little easier for me to kind of navigate through and being able to i've i've been in some of those emotional states before but yeah and then there's the there's that scene of like inspiration when he's going through he sees a Picasso painting on the wall and you see that you see a Picasso painting on an IMAX screen it's insane it really had a big effect on me and then he's in bed and he sees this atom swirling around and around and it moves faster and faster and like writing that kind of exhilarating music is so fun and also at times it was mathematically challenging for me and And it was really interesting how I had to combine the emotional but also with the theory, which is also kind of part of my background in education and how you can use theory.
18:20What is it, theory only takes it so far? Yeah. but then there's also these more complicated emotions and feelings like when he's done the first Trinity test and he's about to have his congratulatory speech to his team and to his you know to all the scientists and he's having a fucking panic attack one of the most striking things I've seen in a long time yeah and that was just that it's so complex and it's so that visceral and cathartic that experience I remember They had that even reading the script. And that was so hard to imagine. So that was the last piece of the puzzle that we did on the movie, that score.
19:03You left it for the end or you were trying? No, we tried it over and over and over again. It wasn't until the last day of the dub when we solved that piece of music. How did it change? I tied it into another, an earlier feeling, an earlier emotion, an earlier scene in the movie, which is the scene when he goes to Los Alamos for the first time. and then he's watching these stars. He's watching these stars getting swallowed with a black hole. And he's talking about, what if I could, you know, be here in Los Alamos and do the thing all the most and work, you know, work it and combine my passion with science.
19:37And this is the first time I'm kind of using these synthesizers that it kind of feels like the impending doom. And these synthesizers are just kind of pulling you downwards in like a downward spiral. And I don't know how I could have thought about it. I was like, what if we take that feeling and that emotion and put it in this scene again? And it worked. You were trying something completely new. Something that just had like horror elements. Like something just, I was just, I was going with that feeling of like horror and shocking. But it wasn't until it got that kind of emotional depth to it that it started to really start to feel real.
20:16I also don't want to make it seem like the music had a big part of that scene. No, but you don't want to under, no, but like, the job you have that is very hard is you don't want to put too much of a mark on it, but you also don't want to fuck up what's on the screen. And you can undercut the moments. Yeah, absolutely. It's like it's one of the best, I think, moments of cinema of all time. That scene. Yeah. And that emotion. I never felt like that before seeing a film. We have to take a quick break. Then we'll come back with more of a conversation with Ludwig Goranson. In today's super competitive business environment, the edge goes to those who push harder, move faster, and level up every tool in their arsenal.
21:01T-Mobile knows all about that. They're now the best network, according to the experts at an Oocla speed test, and they're using that network to launch Supermobile, the first and only business plan to combine intelligent performance, built-in security, and seamless satellite coverage. With Supermobile, your performance, security, and coverage are supercharged. With a network that adapts in real time, your business stays operating at peak capacity, even in times of high demand. With built-in security on the first nationwide 5G advanced network, you keep private data private for you, your team, your clients.
21:38and with seamless coverage from the world's largest satellite to mobile constellation, your whole team can text and stay updated even when they're off the grid. That's your business, Supercharged. Learn more at supermobile.com. Seamless coverage with compatible devices in most outdoor areas in the U.S. where you can see the sky. Best network based on analysis by Ukla of Speedtest Intelligence Data 1H 2025. The greatest music stories aren't always in the songs themselves. They're in the late night studio sessions, the chance encounters, and the cultural moments that shaped entire movements. For music lovers who find themselves going down rabbit holes about their favorite artists, Claude, an AI thinking partner, helps you explore those deeper questions.
22:26Whether you're wondering about the connections between different scenes, trying to understand what drove a particular creative period, or exploring how social movements influenced sound, Claude works through these complex cultural puzzles with you. It's built for people who know that understanding music means understanding the human stories behind it. Claude doesn't just compile facts. It helps you see patterns across decades of music history, ask the kinds of follow-up questions that reveal deeper truths, and works through the nuanced relationships between artists, movements, and moments. Whether you're a music journalist, industry professional, or someone who just lives for understanding the stories behind the sounds, Claude matches your level of curiosity about what really drives great art.
23:09Try Claude for free at Claude.ai slash Broken Record and see why the world's best problem solvers choose Claude as their thinking partner. This episode of Broken Record is brought to you by Chase Sapphire Reserve. Everybody loves to travel, right? We can get away as a once-in-a-lifetime vacation, all of it. And no matter where you're going, Chase Sapphire Reserve is your gateway to the world's most captivating destinations. Travel is its own reward, you know. You're out there having experiences you can't have any other way, and with your Chase Sapphire Reserve card, you're also being rewarded.
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24:16Discover more with Chase Sapphire Reserve at chase.com slash sapphire reserve. Cards issued by JPMorgan Chase Bank and a member FDIC. Subject to credit approval. Terms apply. we're back with more from ludwig gorenson earlier you said mathematically i think the phrase you use is mathematically complex or what did you mean by that like the score was that there's there's some parts in the score where i've uh was able to get ideas out with music that i haven't been able to achieve before with with that i'm describing those scenes where you feel like there's a constant tempo change, like everything's getting faster and faster and faster.
24:59And I was trying to channel the feelings of the energy of constantly pushing the boundaries of energy forward, like the spinning atoms. And the way that I achieved that was through math with having the constant tempo changes in a way where it didn't make musically sense. So in a way you can kind of only do it on the computer. is 21 tempo changes in this piece of music. But what made it human was we had it did all with the live string ensemble recorded that all those tempo changes live in one continuous performance. But that was all a lot thanks to math and to the computer that I was able to do this kind of interesting tempo changes with this exotonic string pattern at a six note scale that I was working with at the time.
25:51And that six note scale is something that I had in my toolbox from college. Did you mind showing us what a hexatonic scale is and maybe how that translated to some degree? Yeah, so basically a hexatonic scale is a six note scale. And you can make a six note scale from two chords that doesn't have any similar notes with each other. So two chords that doesn't have any of the same notes with each other is like a B minor and a C major. So that makes this scale.
26:33So, and out of these six notes, you can make patterns, right?
27:01so that's just that's just the basic and that's that's combining a b minor scale with the c major scale b minor chord b minor the b minor chord is and then the c major chord is c e g this that's six notes so arpeggiating both of those Yeah, so I'm starting with the B minor, C major, and then I'm doing the B minor again by starting the third on the minor third. And then the major third of the C major.
27:37And you can make a thousand different different patterns within these six notes, you know like
27:53You know, so one of the patterns that ended up making for this movie is this.
28:26that's that's the hexatonic scale why do you think the hexatonic scale came to you as like a as a tool for uh for for this i i think a lot of uh music ideas come to me and i and i think to creative people i think i think you get a lot of ideas in general to anyone from from like your childhood or from like the times when he felt like sense of inspiration or and i think maybe seeing the scene when he's he is i feel like he's in he's in college somewhere studying and he sees things for the first time this picasso painting he sees he's throwing grass at the wall a glass at the wall he's listening to ride a spring he's he's like discovering all these things for the first time those early scenes in the film yeah and and i was maybe that made me think about when i I discovered things for the first time when I was in college and I was playing these types of scales and I was, you know, playing with my starting band for the first time, my first jazz quintet.
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29:24And I mean, I honestly can't remember exactly what it is, but I think a lot of times you look at yourself and you draw from those moments that had such an impact on you, those first time memories. you know your you know your first kiss you know you don't remember you don't remember how it feels but it's it's deeply rooted inside of you somewhere an emotional memory yeah yeah yeah yeah and there is something about that that is a little fractured sounding yeah yeah and it sounds it's oh yeah it almost sounds like you scale you're practicing on something and then and then but then i maybe i wanted to make it feel like you're like really mastering it and you know how even drilling it yeah mastering it yeah i love it's so funny it is really like feels like three different films in a weird way to me you know i could really enjoy any of the acts on their own isolated you know the first act's a great movie yeah the second act is i mean just the trinity stuff is out of out of control how did you start processing the trinity stuff from a composition standpoint versus the early stuff the trinity stuff is up until that point when these when they start preparing for the trinity tests everything's been scribbles on the notepad or you know or theories or you know conversations and when you see the bomb for the first time the actual bomb the physical thing it's like i wanted the music to to change character there so I kind of threw all the organic elements on the side and just changed the tone of the music for a little bit and had focused more on sound design and used like three elements which is one of them being like this throbbing bass this thumping bass which almost sounds like a heartbeat and then you have a little ticking sound like kind of like a Geiger counter like and then this crackling sound effects that sounds kind of like a nuclear reaction or something.
31:30And that's just those three elements. And it's a big shift of the music in the film to that point. I mean, it's already kind of like that oh shit moment, but like you're literally there at that moment. You're like, they could blow up the whole world. They could kill all of us. They still can. Yeah. And then I would say one of the other important parts of the puzzle was to find the right theme for for the for kitty and which is kind of the the love theme and you know she's the person that that really holds him down you know and and angers him as a person and and you can tell that she's making a lot of the big decisions too i think um and she's such an interesting character and i think the relationship they had i think was was was very special and beautiful yeah And important to him.
32:26So I wanted her theme to feel completely like almost like a, the yin to his yang. Yeah. And. It certainly seemed like he needed her. Yeah. But in the end, like the way that they're working together and then especially the, you know, the last thing where she's testifying, you know, how important that was. Oh my God. Yeah. Right. And so I wanted her, you know, her theme has this, the richness of the piano. And it's also a waltz. And it starts with these chords that are just have these long pauses in between them to kind of highlight the tension. Because the scenes where she is in, like, there's so much tension.
33:03Like, her performance is incredible. Like, especially, you know, when she's at the... The deposition. Yeah, the deposition. Oh, my God. She's witnessing and you're having these chords. and like you don't know where it's going to go. Is she going to make it or break it, you know? But they just, I feel like the way it grows just kind of makes you feel like how strong of a character she is. And then you have the cello melody playing her theme and then the violin melody, who's Oppenheimer's instrument, kind of joins in in the middle and it becomes a waltz and the two cellos and the violin are playing against each other and it's almost like they're dancing together.
33:42Do you mind playing some of those warm chords? I would just love to hear the kind of what you're...
34:18Thank you.
34:58We're going to pause briefly, then come back with more from Ludwig Gorenson. In today's super competitive business environment, the edge goes to those who push harder, move faster, and level up every tool in their arsenal. T-Mobile knows all about that. They're now the best network, according to the experts at an Oocla speed test. And they're using that network to launch Supermobile, the first and only business plan to combine intelligent performance, built-in security, and seamless satellite coverage. With Supermobile, your performance, security, and coverage are supercharged. With a network that adapts in real time, your business stays operating at peak capacity, even in times of high demand.
35:43With built-in security on the first nationwide 5G advanced network, you keep private data private for you, your team, your clients. And with seamless coverage from the world's largest satellite-to-mobile constellation, your whole team can text and stay updated even when they're off the grid. That's your business, Supercharged. Learn more at supermobile.com. Seamless coverage with compatible devices in most outdoor areas in the U.S. where you can see the sky. Best network based on analysis by Ukla of Speedtest Intelligence Data 1H 2025. The greatest music stories aren't always in the songs themselves.
36:25They're in the late night studio sessions, the chance encounters, and the cultural moments that shaped entire movements. For music lovers who find themselves going down rabbit holes about their favorite artists, Claude, an AI thinking partner, helps you explore those deeper questions. Whether you're wondering about the connections between different scenes, trying to understand what drove a particular creative period, or exploring how social movements influenced sound, Claude works through these complex cultural puzzles with you. It's built for people who know that understanding music means understanding the human stories behind it.
36:58Claude doesn't just compile facts. It helps you see patterns across decades of music history, ask the kinds of follow-up questions that reveal deeper truths, and works through the nuanced relationships between artists, movements, and moments. Whether you're a music journalist, industry professional, or someone who just lives for understanding the stories behind the sounds, Claude matches your level of curiosity about what really drives great art. Try Claude for free at Claude.ai slash Broken Record and see why the world's best problem solvers choose Claude as their thinking partner. This episode of Broken Record is brought to you by Chase Sapphire Reserve.
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38:13And that's not even mentioning how the card gets you into the Sapphire Lounge by the club at select airports nationwide and access to one-of-a-kind experiences like music festivals and sports events. Whether you're booking your next big trip or a weekend escape, Chase Sapphire Reserve makes travel more rewarding. Discover more with Chase Sapphire Reserve at chase.com slash sapphire reserve. Cards issued by JPMorgan Chase Bank and a member FDIC. Subject to credit approval. Terms apply. We're back with the rest of my conversation with Ludwig Gorenson. Jazz was sort of early on where your interests laid musically, right?
38:52Yeah, that's where it went in high school and college. When did classical music enter your life, if ever? It was right before I got into jazz, actually. It was like around the same time I got into jazz a little earlier. and first I was into heavy metal and rock and instrumental rock and guitar shredding and heavy dark metal. Then I got into pop music and try to I wanted to be part of the Sharon studio in Stockholm like working on Britney Spears and Baxter Boyce and like that. Shurning out the factory hits. Those are good stuff. That was in high school being part of Max Martin's studio. And I think that was that kind of went hand in hand with me being very interested in technology at an early age like i loved being able to record myself i have like a four track portable recorder that i was experimenting with at home and if you turn the cassette tape on the other side like some half of the tracks went backwards and and then i got a eight track eight at a quarter and just messing around with that and and drum machines and it was there was something about technology that kind of spruced my interest in in in recording myself and and i mean i was always playing you know recording myself and playing it for my parents and listening to it obviously over and over by myself i guess it became a way where you could hear you could really hear yourself how you were playing and you could get better and you could like hear like okay i really need to practice on this or practice on that.
40:30And then I had a program on my computer called like impulse tracker, where I was able to program like one zeros and ones and make music that way. That was before I had Cubase and that stuff. Pre-Cubase. Yeah, pre-Cubase, pre-DAW. Yeah. And then getting a synthesizer and being able to just play around with that and hearing those like creating weird sounds. And I also went to music elementary school. so all my friends were also in music and I was able to start a band and we had a very, very cool band together called Thrombosis in sixth grade. Thrombosis. Yeah, like a hardcore band. Did you record the group?
41:09Yeah, yeah I did. I was the recording engineer in the mixer and we made a little tape and we sold it at the local record store for$2 and then we got a review in our local newspaper, two out of five. Exhilarating. No, it was heartbreaking. We were so depressed. That's your first go, you know, to even get picked up. Yeah, but in our minds, this was the best music ever created. Of course. Of course. Do you remember anything that they said in the review? I think they were trying maybe a little to make it sound nice, like where these guys go in sixth grade or starting out. But it was kind of like, it felt like belittling.
41:49Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because we thought we were competing with the real gang, so like the real boys the big dogs yeah the big dogs it's very unique I guess to have grown up so far away from you know like New York LA and to have had like a Max Martin there making music around you know yeah and that this was before that I was into that Max Martin pop music this was in this was when like our town where we were from was all in like hardcore scene yeah like we had Millencolin in Sweden and then we had some other they were not from my hometown but we had other like hardcore bands from my town called one was called nine and one was called outlast and there was a it was a pretty pretty cool time and then i remember seeing when i saw meshuga for the first time and in like seventh grade or sixth grade and that was a cool experience does that stuff still resonate with you yeah absolutely they're they are like my probably the only metal band i still listen to meshuga yeah yeah one of my favorite live bands did you guys view american hardcore and metal as being a a little watered down?
42:55It was hard to have access to that music, for me at least. I guess Metallica though would have been like big or something, right? Of course. That was like the dream, right? I mean, it was at least my dream band. And I think also in our culture in Sweden, in Scandinavia, it's like you always look up to America. And I think that's in every kind of fields. Is it true that you discovered USC just on the internet? like you had no idea what USC was. You had never heard of it. Yeah, it was very complicated to try to find colleges and try to find schools. And I had to do it all by myself, no counseling, no.
43:37All that was so foreign. This was 2006, so the websites were still kind of ugly looking. Yeah, very rudimentary. And I'd never been to the States. I didn't know anyone in the States. It's very, very, very, very, very far. The closest relationship to the States was probably like the Brett Easton Ellis books that I was reading at the time. Oh, yeah. That's a great view of America. You must have gotten. Jesus. Surprised you came. Why LA over New York? I knew that I wanted to do film scoring. Got it. I had gotten really into film scoring. I'd gotten to work with an orchestra in high school and having them perform my music for the first time, like having written music for orchestra, 70 people that was playing my music in a concert hall, that feeling was transcending everything else.
44:30So it's like trying to think about how I can do that again. And also the music that I wrote was very much like John Williams and if Star Wars was in Nightmare Before Christmas. and i knew that after that that i wanted to become better on my instrument and also in sweden like the only kind of route you can take is through education and the most one of the most difficult schools to get into was the royal college of music and jazz and guitar but you did and and after i didn't get in the first time uh so i had to take a year off and like practice more and i went to another school called the people school where you just in the middle of nowhere just play on your instruments and you just play around you know the countryside like yeah countryside and there's everyone in your class is just there to play and it's it's amazing uh and then i got in um what did you have to audition yeah yeah what did you have to do to get in it was nerve-wracking because it was i think i don't know 100 people applying for two spots you know and these are 100 more like i would say half of those 100 are like really good at their instrument and it's the first day of edition uh you play i think you play a song you play standard and any standard you want on leaves maybe whatever yeah i think i played uh i think my first edition i played a pat metheny song that's on his trio album it was a song called never too far away from pat metheny's album questions and answers and so you played the first day you play one song and then you stay at school the whole day and you're just nerve-wracking just waiting for that list to get put on the wall who makes the next cut and uh you know and there's 20 i think 20 people go to the next round and then day two if you're lucky enough to be able to make it day two then there's i think a sight reading test there's um i think uh just improvisation tests where they put some chords in front of you and just improvise and then the band is playing like five different tempos and different time signatures and then you have to, after that you have to wait and then there's also like a theater test, a piano test and then you have to wait for three months or something like that.
46:50Crazy. Yeah, and so you do that test in like Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö, which is the three cities that has the College of Music. God damn. Was it gutting to not get in? Yeah. Because I was most, I mean most most of the times I always kind of, most of my life I had kind of like a, in music, I always kind of got, I set up goals for myself that I always made. You must have had supreme confidence in yourself. Yeah. You showed up playing some Matheny. Yeah. Yeah, you figured it was. I definitely had confidence because of like my band is in high school and got to write the music for the orchestra.
47:26And then, but it was a very important part of my career to finally get into the Royal College of Music and then not being the best of my instrument, being like, feeling like shit. I had to practice for two years every day, five, three, four hours a day. Do you think you really got much better? Oh, yeah. That's how I spent the first two years. And then the last year I started my own band and we won a bunch of competitions and it was kind of like, oh, look, I was able to. You didn't think that I was going to do this. So you did that. And then you felt like just moving to LA without some sort of structure felt maybe a little you put yourself too out too far out on a limb and that's why you decided to try out usc yeah i don't i don't think you can even move to la as a as a tourist i mean you could you could live there for three months that's a great point you wouldn't have had no you would have had to have a job how would you get a job if you unless you're here and you can't get here without the job yeah right that would have been impossible so i had won a couple of film music competitions in one of them was in Netherlands and the first prize of when I won that competition was to score a commercial so I got a job for like a music commercial house in Netherlands and I was still in Stockholm this was right before I finished college but that was like a very to me winning that competition and talking and doing like a film scoring job was like pretty cool and I knew that maybe I had potential in this.
49:00And I also scored a couple of student features in Stockholm. So I applied to UC. I found the website. I found the school in New York, found a school in LA, maybe one in England and one in Australia. And I only applied to the one in LA because I wanted the type of films that I wanted to work on. And I got a phone call from the professor, Brian King. And he was the head of my program at the time. And he was like, hey, man, this is Brian calling you from L.A. It's sunshine every day. You have to move here. You're going to love it, bro. I was like, okay. Sounds amazing. Sounds great. Great California pitch.
49:42That's the typical. With that, like, super positive voice. You're going to love it, bro. And I was like, hell yeah. Dude, I'm totally doing this. My parents were a little hesitant. but yeah, I made the move. Didn't know anyone in LA. First couple of, first year was very difficult. LA is hard when you don't know people and you don't know the lay of the land. It's not very forgiving if you just. No, it was like, I was crying every night for like at least the first three months. I can only imagine. On the bus back from UC on Venice Boulevard back to Colorado City. Wow. and so I found I moved closer to USC and I moved into it was a fraternity house that then they had thrown out the fraternity so it was only open for grad students oh great and and then it literally felt like I was walking into American Pie oh like I didn't know the culture but everyone on my street was partying every night and it was great I mean that is a strong error for USC it's falling on hard times right now but that 2006 2006 or 2007 USC.
50:52Yeah. That's a strong era. It was amazing. I was in my little room working with headphones every night and just like opening up the blinds and seeing like these dudes and no shirt and drinking alcohol from those red cups and having the life. And so that's also where I met Ryan in that housing. Like pretty quickly, it seems like you started getting work, you know, within a couple of years. I mean, you got Marley and me, you know? yeah I was I was the assistant for Theodore Shapiro who scored Marlamy and he was working on he was scoring Tropic Thunder at the time so I had just finished college and that was my first job and it was amazing must have been fucking incredible yeah Marlamy was a huge movie you know yeah it was it was like Marlamy and yeah and Tropic Thunder Tropic Thunder huge Ben Stiller was in the room when we were recording I was just obviously a fly on the wall sitting in the back you know but like had to pinch myself a couple times like see that I had really gotten this job and then so Teddy that I was working with Shapiro he was an incredible guy like I had a lot of my friends in my class got jobs for other composers that were not nice you know and my but the Teddy that I was working for was incredible he seemed to just really took a liking to you mentored me you know taught me so much about you know the crafts of film scoring because it's writing musical film is there's definitely a craft to it, writing music, especially when, I mean, timing is everything.
52:24How long did it take you to figure out just the process, the various processes that are involved? I think I worked for, I was head assistant for about two or three years, and I was just looking at the craft and looking at how you craft the scene and how you craft where the music ends, where it starts, how you build it up. And also at UC, you had some great professors and the reason why I wanted to go there was that all of the professors are kind of working in the business too. But after, I think it was about 2010 or 2009, 2009, I think I got my first job, which was community. Right. And that was an incredible chance for me to get that TV show.
53:07And it was a big chance for me. And the Rooster Brothers hired me and Dan Harmon. How did you meet them? They, on Teddy's recommendation. because they had worked with him before and he didn't have time to do the show and he said, like, my assistant's great. And that show was, I put, you know, all my time, 12 hours in a day in making music for that show and it was the greatest training because, you know, the Russo brothers really cared about the music. Dan Harmon really cared about the music. We scored it with live orchestra a couple episodes and one episode was Lord of the Rings spoof. one episode was like a Star Wars movie.
53:47Like I got to do all these styles of music. Yeah. So I got really kind of trained my chops. And the music had a huge part in this show. And then after that, I got, because the music supervisors on that show referred me to, it was a bit Meriwether who did New Girl and she hired me for that show. And then. That would have been like 2011 or something. Yeah. And then Happy Endings was another show that I did. And I was really into like the sitcom show. I had like three shows on network, on air every week. It's huge. Yeah. That must be a grind. Yeah. And I was like 27 maybe. Were you still feeling like, dang, I want to get a movie?
54:27Yeah. I was like, I was starting to get a little bit, not nervous, but I was, I definitely felt like, oh, I can, I can do this for this in my life. I can see how you can really just, because it's so hard to say no. Like someone's asking for another TV show. Hey, you want to do this TV show? Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Like I'm going to meet new people, going to get another good paycheck and I can like make my team bigger. And, and there's, you know, I could easily taken on 10 TV shows a week and like kind of made myself, you know, an incredible life. That's another version of a incredible Ludwig Gorenson life, you know?
55:07Yeah. But creatively, maybe I wouldn't have been as content as I am now. I'm sure. I'm sure. Probably to some degree. Is there anything that to this day that if you think about makes you wince a little? Wince? Just an experience like you fucked something up or where you just sort of feel like I wish I'd done that different even or I wish I had just... Maybe I can look back and it's like, okay, well I didn't need to do that project but it's when you started when you get started and like it's, you know, you don't you're also learning when saying no and but I think probably, I mean, definitely the most challenging projects I worked on was definitely like the last two years going from Wakanda and straight into Oppenheimer.
55:52Like this, just the weight of both projects and like them being so, a huge movie, two huge movies. Yeah, two huge. Back to back. Yeah. And that had, both of them had a heavy weight to it. We were talking before, I got a five and a seven year old man. So Troll's World Tour is big in my house. I got to say that soundtrack is banging. How was working on that with Justin Timberlake and Anderson. . . Yeah, that was a lot of fun. I was, man, I was, I'd done Awaken My Love. I was about to do Mandalorian or I was starting, I had started out with Mandalorian. I think I got an Oscar for Panther one and I was doing Trolls World Tour right before Tenet.
56:41but I didn't do the score I was doing the songs and I just thought it was so fun because obviously the whole story was driven by music so we get the chance to do all these covers and to do all these original songs were you able to help in the selection of some of the songs? yeah no I was very much part of everything Justin and me worked close together on the selection of songs and then also in terms of like how we made the originals. You know, we got Anderson Paak on one or two songs. His originals on there are so good. They're really good. Yeah. Yeah, and then I got to work with Max Martin on their song.
57:24SZA, James Foneroy did a song with him. Good group people, fun people. Your range as you're listening that often, it's like Black Panther and Tenet and Trolls World Tour. It's like, oh my God. But the range is just out of control. A Haim song too. The rock and roll rules. It was like rock and roll rules. Yeah, that's right. So good. So you're trying to kind of thin out your schedule a bit, I guess. What's kind of going to, how do you, you're guiding sort of light or principle going forward. How are you going to know what to say yes to and what to say no to? I mean, I feel like I have a pretty good sense of my next five years or my next 10 years, the type of projects that I want to do.
58:14I constantly want to challenge myself. and I also feel I'm very fortunate to be working with collaborators and people that I think are really pushing the format and film forward and pushing the music forward so yeah right now I'm just taking a little breather and waiting for the craziness to start up again maybe middle next year I actually don't know Are you committed to a couple projects already? I know. I'm just working on my own music right now. My own album. Great. Yeah. How far into that are we? I started it 2018 and then Black Panther 1 came along. So I got like 50 % done. And then I started again 2019 and I got like 80 % done.
59:07And then another movie came along. So I was like, I need to finish this now before the next thing starts. And what's it sound like? What's the... it's kind of like psychedelic quirky proggy all organic elements and I'm trying to sing too cool man well thanks so much man congratulations on all the success man thanks for all the incredible music man from stuff that I just enjoy putting on myself to this you know giving my kids something to put on that won't make me want to jump out the car it's like just appreciate you having you out in the musical universe No, thank you for having me on this podcast and so nice to talk to you and really appreciate your time.
59:51Yeah, thank you, man.
1:00:15You can follow us on Twitter at Broken Record. Broken Record is produced and edited by Leah Rose with marketing help from Eric Sandler and Jordan McMillan. Our engineer is Ben Toleday. Broken Record is a production of Pushkin Industries. If you love this show and others from Pushkin, consider subscribing to Pushkin Plus. Pushkin Plus is a podcast subscription that offers bonus content and ad-free listening for$4.99 a month. Look for Pushkin Plus on Apple Podcast subscriptions. And if you like this show, please remember to share, rate, and review us on your podcast app. Our theme music is by Kenny Beats.
1:00:52I'm Justin Richmond.
1:00:59The more you learn about your favorite artists, the more you want to know. Claude helps you keep digging, finding new threads and rabbit holes to explore. Whether it's discovering deeper meaning behind a detail in an interview, or figuring out the influence behind an artist's particular era. Claude thinks with you to find the next clue. If you can't get enough of the stories behind your favorite music and artists, Cloud will help you discover new layers you didn't know existed. Try Cloud for free at cloud.ai slash brokenrecord. This episode of Broken Record is brought to you by Chase Sapphire Reserve.
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1:02:10Subject to credit approval, terms apply. You've probably heard me say this. Connection is one of the biggest keys to happiness. And one of my favorite ways to build that, scruffy hospitality. Inviting people over even when things aren't perfect. Because just being together, laughing, chatting, cooking, makes you feel good. That's why I love Bosch. Bosch fridges with VitaFresh technology keep ingredients fresher longer, so you're always ready to whip up a meal and share a special moment. Fresh foods show you care. And it shows the people you love that they matter. Learn more. Visit BoschHomeUS.com.
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From the publisher
Ludwig Göransson is one of the most accomplished and distinctive film composers of the 21st century. In 2020, after working on the movie Tenet together, acclaimed director Christopher Nolan hired Göransson to score what has become one of the biggest movies of 2023: Oppenheimer.
Ludwig, who emigrated to Los Angeles from his native Sweden in 2007, has racked up dozens of writing, producing and scoring credits. He started out working in TV and he eventually started scoring films with his old college friend Ryan Coogler. Ludwig composed music for all of Coogler's hit movies including Fruitvale Station, the Creed series, and both Black Panther films—the first of which won him the Academy Award for Best Original Score in 2019.
On today’s episode Justin Richmond talks to Ludwig Göransson about his incredible body of work as a composer and producer. He explains how his rigorous musical training in Sweden prepared him to write the complex sections of the Oppenheimer score. Ludwig also plays some of the more moving sections of the score for us in effort to show us how he came up with one of the best soundtracks of the year.
You can hear a playlist of some of our favorite Ludwig Göransson songs HERE.
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