Music Composition & Scoring

Original music for productions finishing in China draws on a deep contemporary scoring tradition — Tan Dun's Oscar-winning Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon score, Zhao Jiping's foundational collaborations with Zhang Yimou (Raise the Red Lantern) and Chen Kaige (Farewell My Concubine), Liu Sola's experimental work, and the current generation led by Zhao Lin (Wandering Earth, Detective Chinatown) and Roc Chen (Wandering Earth II) scoring the domestic tentpole pipeline plus arthouse and festival features.

Here is how this works in practice. Recording happens mostly at Beijing Film Group Audio and Shanghai Film Studio Audio for orchestral sessions, with the Beijing Symphony Orchestra at the National Centre for the Performing Arts and the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra at the Shanghai Symphony Hall providing the live string and full-orchestra capacity that wuxia, period epic and tentpole scoring needs. Mango Sound Beijing, iQIYI Audio, Tencent Audio Studio and Bird Audio Beijing carry the hybrid and electronic sessions for contemporary drama, streaming originals and genre work.

The picture on the ground is more specific. Our coordinators introduce directors to composers whose voice fits the project's tone and budget, manage the creative collaboration from spotting session through theme development and demo cycle, and book session musicians from the Central Conservatory of Music and Shanghai Conservatory pools, with traditional-instrument specialists (erhu, pipa, guzheng, dizi) on call for material that calls for them.

Score production runs from first demo through fully mixed music stems delivered on the picture-lock schedule. The process typically opens with a spotting session against picture, moves through theme development and director approval cycles, then into cue composition and recording — live orchestra at Beijing Film Group or Shanghai Film Studio with Beijing Symphony or Shanghai Symphony players, hybrid sessions blending live soloists with virtual-instrument mockups inside Pro Tools, or fully sample-based mockups depending on budget.

A few details matter here. Live recording sessions track to Dolby Atmos-ready stems where the theatrical or premium home release supports it (Beijing Film Group, Shanghai Film Studio and Wanda Qingdao all hold Atmos certification), with calibrated 5.1, stereo and mono downmixes for streaming and broadcast targets across CCTV, iQIYI, Tencent Video, Youku and Mango TV. Rights administration runs through MCSC (China Music Copyright Society, 中国音乐著作权协会) for the Chinese territory and CAVCA where audiovisual copyright applies, with the international PRO of the composer's home registration handling outside-China collection. Standard agreements transfer full ownership of original compositions to the producer including publishing and mechanical rights, framed up front in the composer contract so there's no rights ambiguity at broadcaster, distributor or platform delivery.