91.8 The Fan - Kana's Korner Interviews Daniel Ingram
Transcript by Ekkosangen

Chris: 	Hey everybody out there, welcome back to 91.8 The Fan. I am your host, DJ Christmas, and I have with me a very, very special guest. Would you like to introduce yourself?

DI: 	Hey Chris, this is Daniel Ingram!

Chris: 	Awesome, and Daniel I'm sure a lot of our listeners out there know what you do but for those who are somehow still unaware, could you explain a little bit?

DI: 	Uh, sure! I'm a composer and my specialty for the last, I guess 5 years, has been writing music for animated series' and songs as well.

Chris:	 Very cool! And what sort of series' have you done?

DI:	 My first, the first cartoon I worked on was called "Pucca," and that--

Chris:	 Oh yes!

DI: 	Yeah, you remember that show? I don't know if you saw it, it was a Vuze show, and it was kind of like...a very cool version of Hello Kitty, like it's the Korean version of Hello Kitty that's really quite cool, and that was an amazing show. The second show I worked on after that was Ricky Sprocket, and that only lasted one season but it was actually a really neat show too, it was by the creators of, um...they won an Oscar for their short, it's falling out of my head, the name of that original short, but anyways, David Fine and Allison Fine, they're a couple, they made that. Then after Ricky Sprocket the next show I did was Martha Speaks, and that was my first cartoon series as the headlining composer, and following Martha Speaks, which is ongoing, I started doing...I did a movie called Kung-fu Magoo, I'm doing Pound Puppies right now, and I've been working on My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic since it began last year.

Chris: 	Oh, you said the secret word!

DI: 	*Laughs*

Chris: 	For some reason, it's sort of hard to explain, My Little Pony's picked up a really, really huge cult following.

DI: 	Yeah! I don't know if it's that hard to explain, it is such a cool show!

Chris:	 Friendship is Magic and that seems to be the only explanation that we need.

DI: 	Yeah, I mean, I think they knew, everyone knew going into it, it was a really special show. When I was asked to even just put my original demo submission together, I was...Just the people coming together, knowing Lauren's history, Lauren Faust, who is the creative producer on that series in season 1, and the people I've been working with: Sarah Wall at Studio B, I worked with Jayson Thiessen on Pucca, back on that first show. I just knew, everyone coming together, it was going to be awesome, so I don't think it's such a huge surprise that it's as big as it is. We knew it was going to be something good.

Chris: 	Have you seen any sort of musical differences with My Little Pony as opposed to other series you've done in the past?

DI:	 I think every show is quite...so far, for me, every show has been significantly different from a musical perspective, and I think that's partly because cartoons...You're exploring all the time, "What is the identify of this show going to be?" and every time they make a new show they think "Well, we want our show to have a bit of a unique sound, we want kids to hear it in the other room and know what's playing on the television just from the way it sounds." Heh, it's my mail program going off...So for this show, I think it was different because it's more ambitious from a songwriting perspective...*feedback* Sorry, something's kind of breaking up, can you hear that?

Chris:	 No, it sounds normal to me.

DI: 	Sounds okay? Okay, I'm hearing this weird feedback, sorry. Anyways, the songwriting perspective on that show, they said "Listen, we want to go big cart' launch, let's do big productions," and so that's new for musical perspective for me because I was able to really go beyond the normal little ditties that happen in cartoon shows; just characters on screen singing for a few seconds and it's just not something that anyone pays much attention to.

Chris:	 Yeah, you've had the chance to adapt some other songs and turn them into really big musical numbers. I think one of my favorites is "Art of the Dress."

DI: 	Oh yeah? Yeah! It's funny, writers love to identify, you know, what can we do here that, kind of, not really a parody but just something inspired by. That's something that they do and they come to me with their lyrics, in that case Art of the Dress are structured around that song, and I listen to it, I try to listen to it once and I kind of go...okay, I want...there's a certain rhythm to it that suits, that references the song time, but I also try to see if I can do something different with it, because it can't be too close, I don't want to it be an actual parody, I want it to be a unique song in its own right, I want it to suit the show. I think with Art of the Dress, we approached it from more of a pop perspective and went completely in a different direction about the mid point in the song. So yeah, the importances?? we really need for me to get those, to hear those inspirations and bring those in, but I always also love it when I get the opportunity to just do something from scratch and not have to try to be balanced between those two worlds because that can sometimes be difficult, doing something original that's also based on something that's already been done.

Chris: 	Right, right, and that is something you have to watch out for, you don't want it to become a parody, you want it to be, for lack of a better word, more of an homage.

DI: 	In this instance, yes. Sometimes it is a parody. Sometimes it's like, okay let's make something that's really...Like the 80s song, the Cutie Mark Crusaders song. That was actually meant as a parody.

Chris: 	Right.

DI: 	We didn't actually have a reference for what the song was based on, but the idea was that we'd parody something cheesy from the 80s. You know. So some cases, it's really kind of fun to try to do that, and say "How can I make this just really funny that parodies that." But in these songs we're actually trying to not parody so much as do an homage and also create something distinct for the show.

Chris: 	Right, and especially with songs like Winter Wrap Up and At the Gala, it comprises a good chunk of the episode.

DI: 	Yeah! Those are...those are long songs, for a cartoon these days. I hear that in family guy you do get shows where they do these big musical numbers, and I think in the last few years songs have become really revered in television in general, I mean even just like popularity of a show like Glee, and American Idol. People do love songs, and in My Little Pony there was a tradition in previous iterations of the series of always having songs almost every episode. So I know they want to continue that tradition, but also push it farther. so instead of a one minute song, yeah. Like with Winter Wrap Up and At the Gala, I think those are pushing three and a half, four minutes and in a cartoon series that's pretty ambitious.

Chris:	 And have you ever had any difficulties working with the singers for those?

DI: 	*laughs* That...Yes and no. The singers who are singing on all the songs are great, and in fact, the challenge wasn't so much in working with the singers, because they're amazing professionals, but finding the right singers. Because, there's this balance between, are we trying to make a character here? Do we want them to sing a character who might get more of that humor across? Or do we want this sung very professionally?
	On shows like Martha Speaks, it was always, we actually had to get Tabitha St. Germain, who plays Martha and is a very good singer, I did some country songs for her and they were, they were supposed to be...I wanted them to sound nice, like good country songs, and the network came back and said, yeah, can you re-record these and just make...more, like...the character more funny? So with My Little Pony, we had that mind and it was like, okay at what point are we gonna just say okay this is a good character singer but we want her to sing beautifully versus just sort of honor the original voice.
	So as you know some of the characters are voice doubles, some are the originals, and that was an effort to balance those two things, and, of course, I got lucky because Ashleigh [Applejack/Rainbow Dash] and Andrea [Fluttershy/Pinkie Pie] are great singers, and I was able to find some singers through a bit of research and auditions who could play the other characters and sing a little bit more, like, professional, like a princess or something that's more, like you'd hear on an album.

Chris:	 Right, and it seemed to me that one of the more difficult challenges would be whenever Applejack has an extended singing period because you also have to work the accent in there.

DI: 	*laughs* Right! I think that's right. Andrea is the only one who...So Ashleigh is the only one who sings on both of her characters without a voice double. Surprisingly, it was never that much of a challenge, she's a professional singer as well as a voice actor, she sings in a band. So we get in and we usually do, I think we always did Rainbow Dash first because it was a little more natural, and then Applejack's a little bit more affected, so we'd do that second. I think we had, I had to do a little bit of E-Qing on it to make it sound a bit younger, so there's a little bit more processing that happens with Applejack just to kind of create that distinction, but ninty percent of it is her just able to do that with her voice, it's quite amazing.

Chris: 	Yeah, and it really helps out for the final production of the show when you have talented actors and singers knowing what they're doing.

DI: 	Oh yeah, for sure. We're lucky here in Vancouver here, we do a lot of cartoon production in Vancouver, and as such, we actually have a very deep base, very talented actors who get a lot of experience, they work on a lot of different shows, so they got that exposure. That's actually very satisfying, even the little kids are incredibly talented. I had to sort of write and produce about thirty music videos on Martha Speaks this last summer, and I didn't write very song, but I wrote a handful of songs and some other artists around Canada wrote the other songs, but I was in charge of bringing all the kids together and recording with them, and some of them are actors on My Little Pony as well, and getting those kids in the studio and hearing them just belt this stuff and have so much fun with it is probably one of the most satisfying days on the job. Those are the days I really look forward to, getting in the studio with the actors and singing the songs and kind of bringing them to life because prior to that it's only me hearing myself sing them and that's never as satisfying.

Chris:	 Definitely, and speaking of just having fun with it, you're actually one of the crew members on My Little Pony who knows quite a bit about the fanbase.

DI: 	Yeah! Recently, I didn't know, I didn't really, actually...I wasn't very exposed to it until one of the fans, Austin, e-mailed me and said "Hey, you know, do you realize you've kind of got this fanbase?" and also Tech, he e-mailed me and asked me about doing this interview on Equestria Daily and that was maybe a month ago or so, a couple months ago now, and that was the first time I was actually aware that the show had that fanbase online, and for me, because I'm working on it, season 2, I'm excited, my head's wrapped around it, I'm into it, it's sort of fun to get that inspiration to get on and see what people are doing, see what people are saying, and use that to, kinda, help me keep up through the long nights when we're working on a deadline and know that it matters to a lot of people. So it's pretty cool for me to be able to witness that fan, that fandom enthusiasm.

Chris: 	One of my personal favorite fan mutations is Eurobeat Brony, which I'm told you know a little bit about as well.

DI: 	Yeah, for sure! We've communicated, he sent me...like sometimes I get to preview one of his tracks, and check it out, and the other work he does. That's really kind of an honor for me, that the first time in my career...usually with music that takes place in the background on a cartoon series, we kind of fly under the radar, we're not very visible composers for the most part unless it's, like, prime-time adult cartoons like The Simpsons or something. So to go from that expectation of not really having anyone pay that much attention to the music to suddenly having really talented artists, like Eurobeat Brony, feel inspired enough to take these songs and really put the time in to create...Like when he works on these songs, they're very, I notice I can hear the influence, I can hear how he integrates the melody and it's very clever and it's often some time in the middle of the track, it's not even in the beginning, and he kind of does his own thing for a while, then it brings it in, then it goes in its own direction and they're very creative. That's super-exciting for me to go "Hey wow there's something I did that inspired something totally new." so that's really cool.

Chris: 	Definitely, and I remember reading on Ponychan, I browse there every so often, that somebody once said that they can identify which episode is just from the initial background music.

DI: 	Sorry, can you say that again?"

Chris: 	They can identify each individual episode from the background music at the start.

DI: 	Oh! Yeah, that's cool! Well Will does the background music, Will Anderson, and I get to go into the mixes sometimes and hear what he does on the show, and he is a really talented guy, and I think his music is another one of the reasons why that show is, just one of the many sort of reasons why artistically it comes together in such a satisfying show, and I know he's put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into it his first year as well.

Chris: 	Definitely. But I think we're going to take a quick musical break here, but when we come back we'll have more of Daniel Ingram, so keep it tuned to 91.8 The Fan, everything you want and nothing you don't!

*Intermission*

Chris: 	Hey everybody out there, welcome back from our musical break. I'm still here, and I still have my very special guest. Would you like to give everyone a sign of life?

DI: 	Oh! Hey everybody, how you doing?

Chris: 	There he is. It has happened before, we've come back from break and been like "Hey, we're still here, here's our special guest!" and our special guest has been disconnected.

DI: 	*laughs* Nope, still here.

Chris:	 That's good, because then I'd just look silly. But I've been looking around and I've seen a couple of fan questions, and we know that you do have contracts that need to be obligated, but to the best of your ability I was hoping you could answer a couple of them.

DI: 	Sure! I can listen and I'll do my best.

Chris: 	Awesome. I saw one here on Ponychan earlier, an anonymous asker was wondering if you had anything to do with the new My Little Pony commercial, and if there were more of them on the way?

DI: 	That's a good question. Actually, I was surprised. The answer is no, and, in fact, when I asked the producer at DHX Media about it too, I was like "Hey did you know about this commercial?" and they didn't know, so it was something done at the HUB through their own creative team at the network level. So, yeah, the short answer is I did not record Equestria Girls, but that is my singer singing on it, Shannon, who sings for Pinkie Pie.

Chris: 	We had a question here in our live chat, a few people are wondering what sort of tools, instruments, hardware you use when you're working on music.

DI: 	That's a great question, it's kind of a tech-head question so you'll have to bear with me if this isn't something that interests you at all. I write music in Logic Pro, version 9 now, and I also run a second computer with ProTools, and the way that works...in the writing computer, on Logic, I have three other PCs hooked up that have a pre-loaded template of sounds, so that's kind of my orchestra, and then within Logic I have all my pop instruments and channels that I would use. Then in ProTools, that's where I record the music into ProTools, and generally in the TV business you deliver a ProTools session once your music is done. So that's essentially the core hardware and software that I'm using.

Chris: 	That's pretty cool, you have, like, a computer hub of all your different programs going on.

DI: 	Yeah, I run a five computer network to work in the television. That seems to be just the right amount, for me.

Chris:	 Have you ever had to work just off of just one or maybe even two and it just wasn't working out for you?

DI: 	Well, okay, if I'm writing a...It depends on what I'm working on. If I'm writing a pop song, I'll just write that on my one Mac, and it just doesn't require the same kind of power that you need if you're writing and orchestral number, where there's a lot more intruments playing. So, I can get away with one computer if I'm just writing a song. If I'm actually synching to picture, writing background music, I'll definitely need ProTools running, and if I'm writing orchestral synching to picture then I'll need all five.

Chris: 	Hm, so it just depends on what you're working on.

DI: 	Yeah, for sure. If I had to just write a song, even like a sketch of a song, I just take my laptop and head off with a microphone and an inbox or something and I'd head off to a cabin, or something, and I can just record it that way, because it's just a demo. But for fully-produced stuff, yeah, thats kind of the breakdown of what I'd need.

Chris: 	And has technology, sort of, advanced since you started working where you've noticed a huge difference in the sort of tools that you would use?

DI: 	Oh definitely. I feel like I was very lucky in terms of timing for how the technology has sort of peaked in the last five, six years. I mean, nowadays you can buy amazingly impressive sample libraries. See, most of the people, when I play for my clients some of the orchestral stuff, like on these songs, they ask, "like, is this a real orchestra?" Like, they can't actually tell. I think most of the people who listen to orchestral music can still tell it's synthetic, but it's pretty exciting the last few years with sample modeling, and Wallander, that's one of the software instruments I use, the Wallander sample model of instruments, and everything from native instruments and Vienna symphonic libraries. You can really, in the last few years, cross that bridge and make some pretty authentic-sounding music out of software.

Chris: 	Definitely! And we just have a few more questions here, most of them regarding season 2 but I know we said earlier behind the scenes that you can't really say too much about season 2 so we should probably say that publicly so everyone knows.

DI: 	Yeah, I can't say anything about season 2. I can say, I'm allowed to say that I've been doing season 2 and that we've been doing production for a few months now and a lot of the stuff has been done. But, the specifics of what songs I've done I can't, unfortunately, talk about right now.

Chris: 	Yeah, I think a specific question was something about a commercial with a song from the upcoming season 2 being in the background.

DI: 	Oh! That was in...yeah. I think I did a little television interview for a local cable station here this week, and I had some music playing in that TV spot and I guess someone listening thought "Is that? Is that Martha--I mean, is that My Little Pony?" but it was actually just a demo, it was actually a song I wrote for Mona the Vampire playing, I guess because it was a girl singing it could sound like a My Little Pony but it wasn't, and the other song I had in that was kind of a silly country song for Martha Speaks. Unfortunately, in that radio, or that TV spot, no, none of that was My Little Pony related, and when I was playing guitar I was just kind of jamming with this one guy, hear me play something.

Chris: 	Yeah, not everything has to be 100% related to season 2 music.

DI: 	*Laughs* Yeah, only 90%.

Chris:	 As much as we'd like to hear the inside peeks, you can't really say too much.

DI: 	Yeah, unfortunately, I would love to, but you know what, that's why they call them spoilers for a reason. It's kind of exciting to wait and it's going to be even more exciting just to have it unfold, so I think people, at the end of the day, don't mind not knowing.

Chris:	 Yeah, and I'm sure that a lot of the fanbase will be waiting with bated breath until season 2 comes out later on this year.

DI: 	Mmhmm, Yeah, so am I!

Chris: 	Aren't we all?

DI: 	Any other questions around that that I might be able to shed some light on?

Chris:	 Nope, I think that pretty much dispells the mist around anything you can say about season 2.

DI: 	Okay.

Chris: 	So, before we wrap up here, I was wondering, I know that you have your own website and social media, could you direct people towards that?

DI: 	Sure, I just put up a facebook, kind of, page that's sort of like a fan page or musician page and that's dannyimusic on facebook, and that's a great place to--

Chris: 	Hey everybody out there, sorry for that unexpected drop! But I am back and so is my good friend Daniel, hey Daniel.

DI: 	Hello, hey!

Chris:	And just as we cut out you were explaining a little bit about your new facebook page that you had set up.

DI: 	Right, so that's Facebook.com/dannyimusic and that's a great spot for people to go and ask questions, I do check it every day or every couple days and see what people are saying, and leave any feedback. It helps me a lot because my clients look at it and they think it's pretty cool that there's been a lot of enthusiasm. You can also check out, add my Twitter account which is dannyimusic as well, on Twitter. Especially when season 2 comes, I'm going to be putting more updates about what's happening. Lastly, you can check out my website which just has some HD clips of stuff I do as well, I try to put anything new up there, and that is www.danielingrammusic.com.

Chris: 	He's very, very consistant, very easy to follow. No twists or turns along the road...

DI: 	*Laughs* Yeah. Is that about my website?

Chris: 	Yeah, your website, twitter, facebook, they all have the same "dannyimusic."

DI: 	Pretty much, yeah.

Chris: 	Awesome! But, before we let you go, we have one final question and that is would you be willing to participate in a 91.8 The Fan tradition?

DI: 	Okay, what's the tradition?

Chris: 	We ask everybody who comes on the show, voice actor or otherwise, if they would be willing to do a radio bump for us.

DI: 	Oh, okay! What do I say?

Chris: 	We ask everybody to say "My name is" You insert your name, "I do this" you can be as broad or specific as you like, and "you're tuned in to 91.8 The Fan."

DI: 	...and you're tuned in to 91.8 the fan...Are you still there?

Chris: 	Yes.

DI: 	'cause I'm getting a bit of a cutout here on my skype. Okay, sounds good!

Chris: 	Yup, and we do it live on air just in case there's any bloopers.

DI: 	*laughs* Okay, here we go. My name is Daniel Ingram, I'm a composer for television and cartoons, and you're listening to 91 8 The Fan.

Chris: 	Awesome! You got it all in the first take.

DI: 	Almost, I didn't say you're tuned in to 91.8 the fan.

Chris: 	Oh that's fine, I don't mind.

DI: 	Okay *laughs*

Chris: 	We've had people say listening, tuned in to, some people give it their own special twist.

DI: 	Sweet.

Chris: 	You did fine. It's not your forte anyway, your hand is in the composing.

DI: 	That's right, I'm not even a great singer. But I'm happy to try it again if you need it, otherwise is there any other questions?

Chris: 	Nope, I do believe that's it but for anybody out there who missed any of this interview, or you're looking for a clean, uninterrupted version, make sure to check out our website because we will have it up there in the next few days. So make sure you keep it tuned to your favorite station, 91.8 The Fan: everything you want and nothing you don't.