Today we’d like to introduce you to Kristina James.
Kristina, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
I grew up in a small farming town called Madera, located in the heart of California. We grew up right next to an open, yellow field with a train track about 200 ft away where trains went by on a daily basis and often rocked the house to an unsettling rhythm. I can still hear those trains in my head. My earliest memory of music was my dad blasting classical music on Saturday mornings to get me and my sister up to do chores. I also remember watching my uncle beautifully play the piano whenever we would visit him and I became obsessed with the need to learn how to play music. I convinced my parents to buy me a cheap little keyboard and began to teach myself around age seven how to play. After a few months of seeing my commitment to learning the piano, my parents enrolled me in private piano lessons which I continued taking until age 13. After a couple of years of studying on my little keyboard, my parents bought me an upright piano from the local music store. My parents weren’t wealthy or anything, so these were huge investments for them which I am forever grateful for. The journey of that piano in my life has an incredible story in itself.
The moment I realized that I wanted to not only play music but write it was when I was 11 years old. A friend and I went to see The Lord of the Rings and my mind was blown! I remember loving the music and thinking to myself that I wanted to write music for a living when I was older.
During grade school, I taught myself many instruments through those public school booklets you might remember. I learned how to play the flute and in middle school, my teacher persuaded me to teach myself the bassoon. I dabbled in a lot of things as a young person. I was the high school band drum major for a couple of years, marched bass drum, cymbals, bells, played in the pit percussion, played piano in the jazz band and continued playing the bassoon. I would often improvise on the piano. I wrote a few of my own piano pieces, one of which I played at a band concert. My home life was, in some ways, really rough as a kid and teenager. Playing music at home and in my school’s music program was probably the one tangible thing that kept me going and kept me out of trouble. I’m forever grateful for the music programs that were in my public schools. These types of programs were a saving grace for me as they are for so many children.
I’m so thankful that my middle school band teacher convinced me to learn the bassoon because it was my ticket into the music program at San Francisco State University. During my first semester, I heard a live, string quartet concert for the first time, played by The Alexander String quartet. I remember having to hide my tears after the performance was over. There was a whole new world of music that I discovered in college. I played in various chamber ensembles, wind band, and orchestras. In my junior year of college, I was allowed to switch my major from performance to composition, which had always been my main objective. In my eight semesters as a composition student, I remember having only one semester where there was another woman in the room and so I sometimes felt a little awkward, but my student colleagues were always respectful and encouraging. However, I had a couple of teachers who said some strange things to me and I still remember those words today, but after working really hard to prove myself, I won those teachers over and we became good friends. I worked really hard in college and at times had two jobs while also teaching bassoon lessons and always had a full course load while also practicing and writing music. Any adversity I’ve faced has always made me more determined to turn my goals into reality. After completing my four years at SFSU, I received my Bachelor’s Degree in Music Composition. During and after college, I continued to play in a community orchestra called “The Bay Area Rainbow Symphony” which is now led by the talented Dawn Harms.
The year after I graduated from SFSU was a really tough year and I ended up moving from San Francisco to Pasadena to live with my sister and brother-in-law. For a couple of years, I didn’t do anything musically except occasionally play in my church’s Sunday morning band. After a couple of years of getting back on my feet, I started to write music again and one of the first serious pieces I wrote was for my wedding. I became determined to keep following my dream of writing music professionally. I thought a lot about my childhood, my experiences with music and the moment when, as a kid, I had decided to be a composer. I thought about Howard Shore and the Lord of the Rings score. So at age 27, I began making plans to attend a film scoring program. I decided to enroll in UCLA extension’s film scoring program and graduated in 2019. Recently, I have done a handful of short films, a couple of competitions, underscores for a concept album and I just finished my first feature-length documentary.
The documentary is an incredible story about the first expeditions down the Yangtze River in China which took place in the 1980’s. The producers have this amazing archival footage of these teams journeying down the river. It’s a story full of determination, inspiration, danger and hope. I felt really honored to write the score. It was my first feature and I was lucky enough to have a budget to hire professional musicians and a studio. The unfortunate thing that happened was COVID 19. The musicians and studio were set to record on March 24, 2020 and the week before recording is when everything happened with COVID. I was devastated for a lot of reasons. The producers and I decided to wait out for a few weeks before making a decision to try and do remote recording. In the end, I did remote recording sessions with the musicians. It was something I had never done before and it was quite challenging. A lot of the musicians had not recorded at home before since they always record in a studio with a recording engineer. But I had some amazing musicians who were determined to adapt and learn. The score turned out beautifully and even though my first feature score experience was not what I had hope for, I learned a lot and am very proud of myself for getting through such a crazy situation.
Right now, I am on the prowl for the next job. I’ve probably sent 100 emails to directors and filled out a dozen formal applications in the last month. A part of the job as a freelance composer is just trying to find the next job and marketing yourself. If there is anything I could say to readers to inspire them, I want them to know that regardless of upbringing, finances, or the adversity you are facing, you can still follow your dreams if you are willing to work hard and ask for help when needed. Never be afraid to ask for help and there are always people who believe in you, but most importantly, just believe in yourself. Despite these turbulent times for most of us, I’m determined to keep working and contribute to telling stories that are important to tell. I believe it is my purpose to bring connectedness and beauty into the lives of as many people as I can. It is an honor to be able to do this through music.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
At times my childhood was very turbulent. It’s hard to talk about but there were issues with domestic violence growing up. My parents divorced when I was 14 and my dad moved halfway across the world. My mom had a really hard time with the divorce and we lost our house when I was 17. My last year of high school we were pretty poor and at times, it felt like the only thing I had were my friends and music. When I first began my composition classes, I didn’t think I was taken very seriously at first and so I had to work really hard to prove myself. The only formal training I ever had was on the piano from age 7 to 13, so in some ways I had to catch up when I started the music program at SFSU. I remember after presenting one of my pieces a professor saying, “That was better than I thought it would be” which I never heard him say about my male counterparts.
Another professor told my bassoon instructor that I had an “attitude” and the bassoon instructor had to defend me. The men in my classes and ensembles could always express themselves freely and in some ways be over the top and were never spoken to like that. I’ve still heard sentiments like this to this day, but it’s something I’ve learned to deal with and it just fuels my passion to fulfill my goals. I never had the money to buy my own bassoon, but I hope one day I will be able to do so. At the end of my 2nd year of college, an extremely kind person, lent me their unused bassoon because they believed in my talent. There have always been the kindest people to show up in my life at the perfect time. I also struggled with a deep depression during and immediately after college. I didn’t really understand what depression was until I moved down to LA and developed the necessary tools to manage it.
Can you give our readers some background on your music?
I am a freelance composer. My emphasis is writing music for film, but I’ve also written music for a few weddings, concerts and a couple of albums. I’m really grateful to have recently landed and completed my first feature film. I’m fortunate that, despite COVID 19 preventing me and my team from recording in a studio, we were able to figure out how to record the score remotely and professionally. I am honored to be one of the very few female composers out there who is multi-racial. I love my Mexican, African, and Native American heritage with a little bit of English thrown in. I think I bring a unique and fresh perspective to telling stories through music because of all my unique experiences in life. I hope I can encourage people to keep working toward their goals and believe in themselves.
Any shoutouts? Who else deserves credit in this story – who has played a meaningful role?
I could not have gotten to this point without the support of so many people. I’m so thankful for my husband Ian, my mom, dad, sister, brother-in-law, and step-dad who’ve been there for me through the highs and the lows and have always supported my calling in music. I’m thankful for my close friends, mother and father-in-law and family who’ve always encouraged me. I’m thankful to colleagues who’ve shared their knowledge, mentored me and given me opportunities, Tim A Edwards and Jon Kull come to mind. I don’t know where I would be without my piano teacher Caroline or the music teachers I’ve had throughout my life. I’m even grateful for the obstacles in my life that have helped me grow and made me resilient. One really encouraging word I received recently was from one of the musicians for the documentary we just completed, in which the person told me how much they enjoyed playing the music and said I was a rising star. This really touched me as the image of a light shining in the darkness is the type of person I want to be.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.kristinajamesmusic.com/
- Phone: 626-787-3552
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: @komposerk
Image Credit:
Corina James, Ian Bergland, Tyson Banks
Suggest a story: VoyageLA is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
