Composer Peter M. Murray can always be found in the familiar company of music. As he (virtually) spoke to me from his Brooklyn studio, he was surrounded by some of his favorite instruments—a piano pushed into a corner, a sound board leaning against the back wall. It was a fitting backdrop to discuss The Overview album, considering these walls (now adorned with lamps and artwork) were once filled with photographs from the book. Shots of flowers in an Indonesia forest by Jacques Brun and of sunsets in the Colombian desert by Théo de Gueltzl were posted as inspiration, among others. He’d tacked them there for over a month, he said, using them as a guide in the creation of the soundtrack.
“I spent a lot of time reading and absorbing [the book], looking at photographs and taking time to see what [the album] should embody and do.”
The time was well spent, as the album not only encompasses the book’s layers, but also gives readers a sonic companion as they traverse across its pages—a journey of words, visuals, and sounds invoking nature. Murray had never scored a book before; yet, it came naturally to him as he set out to accomplish his main goal: to heighten the experience of the reader.
He started by dividing the album into the same core principles outlined in the book: reverence, balance, evolution, and finally healing. For the individual tracks, he dove even further into each section, compiling careful arrangements of synthesizers and percussions for subsections like spirituality, perspective, change, and growth. After reading an essay or gazing at a photograph, Murray would start playing until he found a specific sound or chord progression that translated what he felt.
This visceral approach to music is how his artistic process has always manifested itself, ever since he first heard the radio as a child. What he felt at the time is difficult to explain, he told me. The music seemed to be an extension of him, his body giving him no choice but to pursue it.
“So much of the way I approach composition is rooted in the visceral responses to what I’m writing in the moment, rooted in music as an exercise in presence rather than formal composition.”
“So much of the way I approach composition is rooted in the visceral responses to what I’m writing in the moment, rooted in music as an exercise in presence rather than formal composition.”
For the first theme—reverence—Murray recognized that the start of the album needed to capture this same “texture of the natural world” palpable in the opening chapters, in a way that sparked wonder and awe. The first track starts off slowly, gently—additional sounds seamlessly slip in, each one layering on top of the last. Close your eyes long enough and you may feel as though you’ve entered a forest, the surround sound of nature growing louder the longer you stay. Suddenly, you’re steeped in veneration for the world around you.
The next batch of songs falls under the theme of balance. Murray thought deeply about the interconnectivity of the world and the “delicate balance of ecosystems.” In a world so complex, he asked, how many things need to be in balance for things to go right? “I wanted to convey a sense of fragility as well as strength. Hopefully the music will help us continue to pursue balance when we see imbalance.”
Evolution is the only section to use percussion, creating a pacing that mimics a heartbeat. Arpeggiated synthesizers are employed to conjure feelings of growth and give a sense of future: “[It’s] a nod to where we’re going as opposed to where we have been,” Murray explained.
For the last theme, he would return to an idea put forth in the book’s final pages: in order for a wound to heal it must first be acknowledged. He was moved by this sentiment and wanted listeners to feel the musical tension inspired by this step to healing, even incorporating solfeggio frequencies, which are scientifically proven to have healing properties.
The principles of deep listening, meditation, and teaching are fundamental to both Murray’s artistry as well as the spirit of The Overview, making this collaboration ideal for him. Typically, the multi-hyphenate musician works alone; that’s how composing usually works. But scoring this book gave him an opportunity to “bring someone else’s vision to life.”
“I love [scoring] because I end up making things I never would have made on my own; this project is a prime example of that.”
As for what he hopes listeners take away from this album, he’d like for it to create a space for people to think, feel, act, and be in themselves and in the world. But ultimately, like all art, he feels that once it’s released, it takes on a life of its own. “It’s no longer mine,” he told me with a smile and a shrug. “What people take from it is theirs.”
Listen to the full album here.
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Keeping Score: Peter M. Murray on the Making of The Overview Album
