Liz Myers - UCLA Extension Course 2024 - Summer Quarter Ends 090924

For the past 17 years, Myers has been teaching at UCLA Extension a course entitled “Put Your Music to Work: Composition for Commercials.” In this popular course, Myers give students real work samples of commercials to re-score and then their work is evaluated. In addition she provides numerous topics of compositional skills and the study of other composers’ works and process: e.g. Hans Zimmer, Alexandre Desplat, Thomas Newman along with classical stalwarts such as Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland, Elgar and Stravinsky. Music business revenue for music composers is also discussed with advice and information given on Musicians Federation of Musicians, music licensing, performing royalty organizations, music publishing as well as numerous music engineering tips. In all, this course is considered a great tune up for working composers as well as an expansive introuduction to the rigors and requirements of music used for advertising campaigns and branded entertainment.
Guest speakers enhance the value of the course for the students, and Myers is extremely grateful for their contributions. “There is probably no other educational resource for commercial music in the US that has such a wide range of information and challenging assignments for those music students who are curious about how music can work in conjunction with a powerful visual and a compelling story to inspire consumers to use a product that will hopefully improve their lives,” says Myers. “We score the Big Beats of someone’s life, as it is the human emotion of the very short film that we romance with the successful underscore.”

INTERVIEW WITH JOHN TRIVERS

The Theme for the CBS Evening News (written by Trivers, Myers & Alan Pasqua in 1987 for Dan Rather) has been relaunched with Norah O’Donnell as the news anchor. O’Donnell became the head of the Evening News, inheriting the baton from Jeff Glor who handled the position seamlessly when Scott Pelley left.

Want to watch a recent show? Here is it.

Did you know that 51% of all news anchors are women? Bravo to CBS for putting a woman at the helm of their evening news program. Since Connie Chung (an extraordinary journalist) and Katie Couric (a gifted and savvy interviewer), who paved the way, it’s been long overdue. Women tell it like it is.

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

In honor of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King jr., we found this footage on an AP documentary and have added our recording of a spiritual sung by Louis Price. Because we know that music can influence the way people think, we wanted to post this in the hopes that we can find more tolerance, more activism, and more courage to stand up for civil rights in 2023.