Why ‘The White Lotus’ Became the Hot TV Soundtrack of Summer 2021

thewrap.com:

[HBO series] ‘Enlightened,’ and I loved that show and started really getting into his stuff. I started this project pretty late.

When I came in, we were, like, about a month from mixing time, so I started working only with the script.”Though Hawaii was a backdrop for “White Lotus” that Tapia de Veer was not terriblly familiar with, he knew that the tension of the series would present itself through unveiling emotions under the surface and expressed it with well-utilized instruments.“I have an instrument that’s called a charango, which is small guitar like a ukulele but with more strings,” the composer said. “So, although not being truly native instruments from Hawaii, it was more about, I suppose, this reaction to colonialism.

So, that’s in there in the music as a general paintbrush. And the spirit was kind of Hitchcock, though it doesn’t sound anything like Bernard Herrmann.

It kind of became a joke between Mike and in finding the spirit of this [project]. But it was that feeling there’s going to be a sacrifice by the end of the episode, or somebody’s gonna die, or something terrible might happen.”Lots of percussion pervades the score, including African and shamanic drums, in addition to bass and Tapia de Veer’s prized charango, but he notes that it’s the vocal additions that make the score really pop. “It’s something really attractive to me; I think it catches your attention really fast.