Meet Michael A. Levine

We recently connected with Michael A. Levine and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Michael A. , thank you so much for opening up with us about some important, but sometimes personal topics. One that really matters to us is overcoming Imposter Syndrome because we’ve seen how so many people are held back in life because of this and so we’d really appreciate hearing about how you overcame Imposter Syndrome.
The short answer is, “I haven’t.” But that’s not a bad thing. Let me explain.

Almost every good artist – and every great artist I’ve ever gotten to know personally – has some degree of impostor syndrome. This is because, to learn your craft, you study the greats. Non-musicians may love listening to Bach, but until you’ve spent the time “looking under the hood” and have the technical skills to understand what you’re seeing/hearing it’s hard to communicate just how astonishingly brilliant this man was. Then you compare it with your own work and say, “I’ve GOT to do better.”

I used to work for top film composer Hans Zimmer (and occasionally still do). Hans once told me, “Every time I get hired on a new project, everyone involved is confident I will find the perfect music for their film. Everyone, that is, except me.”

The good thing about saying, “I’ve GOT to do better,” is that it motivates you to do better. And if you keep doing better, after awhile, you get pretty good. As legendary choreographer Martha Graham put it, “No artist is pleased. There is no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is only a queer, divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive than the others.”

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
I’ve played music since I was 4, and wrote songs from 8. I suppose you could say I became a “professional” when, at 16, a friend covered a song I wrote for the B-side of a single. So, it feels like my entire life has been about music one way or another,

But how that has manifested itself has been enormously varied, from work as a street musician in my youth, to accompanying dance classes, playing in country-western and Irish bands; then writing music for commercials (most famously, the KitKat Gimme A Break jingle), theater, the concert stage; and, later, film, television, and games as well as writing and/or producing songs for other artists like The Monkees, Roberta Flack, The Naked Brothers Band, and Lorde.

Nonetheless, I fundamentally believe that music is a form of storytelling. I think it’s one of the reasons I took so well to writing music for film, television, et al. is because the function of music in that context is to help tell a story. In recent years, I have expanded my pursuits to include screenwriting. After having the frustration of a couple of exciting projects NEARLY get made, I wrote a short film that has won 20 festival awards and been praised by many in the industry I respect including Gore Verbinski (Pirates of the Caribbean), Vicky Jenson (Shrek), and Matt Groening (The Simpsons). If you’re curious, here is a link. https://tinyurl.com/TheAspirantShortFilm

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
1) Remember there is no irrelevant experience in your field. When I was young, among other things, I played in an Irish band. By chance, that ended up being the reason I was hired to work on a major film as a player. Through which I met Hans Zimmer and worked for him doing additional music and arranging which, in turn, led to me getting my first television show, Cold Case.

2) Have talented friends. Academy Award-winning actor Robert Duvall told me that he used to room with two other actors when they were all broke and hustling. The other two? Gene Hackman and James Caan.

3) Be persistent – yet patient. Most of your ventures will fail. Just keep going. When I was 29, I had put all my eggs in the basket of an original band I’d formed. We had a record out, and a video on then-must-do MTV. We had a disastrous tour and broke up. I had to borrow money from my dad to pay the rent. I told him I was thinking of going back to school and getting a degree in computer science – something I had abandoned 10 years before – so that I could get a “real” job. This is the moment most parents would say, “Thank God, you’ve come to your senses at last!” Instead he asked, “But don’t you love music?” I said yes, but clearly I was terrible at the business. I will never forget what he said next: “I think you’re being short sighted. You’re good at what you do. You work hard. You love it. Just be patient – it will all work out.” Within three years I had launched my music for advertising career and written the KitKat Gimme A Break jingle.

How can folks who want to work with you connect?
I mentioned that I have been writing scripts. I have a number I’m excited about, some for film, some for television. I am well-represented and decently connected in the music area but am looking for people to pitch and produce my screenplays. If you’d like to check out my work to see if this of interest to you, email me at QuantumW@gmail.com and I will send you loglines and, if you’d like, scripts.

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