Chemical Hearts: Stephen James Taylor Debuts His Score To Amazon’s Romantic Coming Of Age Drama

“Graveyard Walk,” features quiet ambient music comprised of synth and guitar that works to underscore Richard Tanne’s emotional film. – ComingSoon.net

Lakeshore Records has released Chemical Hearts – Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, featuring score by  Stephen James Taylor (Maya Angelou—And Still I Rise).  The score is quietly hypnotic providing a subtly atmospheric backdrop to the emotional teen drama.  The Amazon Original written and directed by Richard Tanne (Southside With You) and starring Lili Reinhart, Austin Abrams, Sarah Jones, Adhir Kalyan, Kara Young, and Coral Peña streams globally on Prime Video beginning today.

Listen to “Graveyard Walk” now at ComingSoon.net.  Listen to the album and see purchase links below.

Soundtrack Available Now: [Download/Listen]

Track List
01. Opening Montage
O2. Walk Home
03. Grace Walkaway #1
04. Grace Walkaway #2
05. Secret Place
06. Dead Stars
07. Graveyard Walk
08. Grace Track
09. Henry’s Story
10. The Kiss
11. Bedroom Scene
12. Brooding Henry
13. The Shrine
14. Run to Grace’s House
15. His Room
16. Lonely Walk
17. Drunken Graveyard
18. Factory Run
19. Confession
20. Final Editorial 

Seventeen-year-old Henry Page (Austin Abrams) has never been in love. He fancies himself a romantic, but the kind of once-in-a-lifetime love he’s been hoping for just hasn’t happened yet. Then, on the first day of senior year, he meets transfer student Grace Town (Lili Reinhart) and it seems all that is about to change. When Grace and Henry are chosen to co-edit the school paper, he is immediately drawn to the mysterious newcomer. As he learns the heartbreaking secret that has changed her life, he finds himself falling in love with her — or at least the person he thinks she is.
 

Says Taylor: “This score required a very light touch because the acting and directing are so strong.  My goal was to provide a gentle but unique musical framework to support the powerful performances onscreen.”
 

 
ABOUT STEPHEN JAMES TAYLOR
Stephen James Taylor has a unique musical identity. His style represents a blend of classical, rock, blues, gospel, world music, homemade instruments, and avante garde. His past projects include scoring Richard Tanne’s 2020 Amazon film Chemical Hearts, music for the Star Wars Cantina at Disneyland’s Galaxy’s Edge (2019) the PBS documentary by Charles Burnett entitled Power To Heal (2018), Maya Angelou-And Still I Rise (2016), Richard Tanne’s theatrical release, Southside With You (2016), Tom Bradley: Bridging the Divide (2015), People Are The Sky, (2015), Marvel’s TV Series The Black Panther, music for  theme parks such as Disney World and The Red Sea Astrarium, Universal’s The Adventures of Brer Rabbit, Disney’s Mickey’s Twice Upon a Christmas (for which he won Best Original Score at the 2004 DVDX Awards), Teachers Pet, a Disney animated feature with wide theatrical release in 2003, and most of the films directed by Academy Award winner, Charles Burnett including To Sleep With Anger and the  blues documentary, Warming By the Devil’s Fire produced by Martin Scorsese. He has composed scores for many of Robert Townsend’s films such as The Making of the Five Heartbeats (2017) Of Boys and Men (2008), Carmen, A HipHopera (2004) and Holiday Heart (2000). In 2001 he wrote underscore and produced some of the songs for Clark Johnson’s Boycott (HBO films) as well as his 2018 Netflix film, Juanita (2017).
 
In 1996 he was commissioned to write an orchestral suite for the Opening Ceremonies of the Olympics and was one of the conductors of the Atlanta Symphony for that occasion. In 1993, Stephen received an Emmy nomination for an R&B song he wrote for I’ll Fly Away as well as a Daytime Emmy nomination for his classical orchestral score for an episode of the animated series, The Lion King’s Timon and Pumbaa. Other Emmy nominations have been for the PBS movie Brother Future (1991), and Raw Toonage an animated series for Disney. In 1999 and 2000 he has received Annie nominations for his work on Disney’s Mickey Mouseworks. He has also done string arrangements for James Taylor and for Crosby, Stills, and Nash.
 
After graduating from Stanford University in 1976 with a B.A. in music, he studied composition for four years with Henri Lazarof, professor of music at UCLA.  He studied microtonality with Erv Wilson for 20 years and whom he helped develop a new 810 key microtonal keyboard used in many of the above scores. Taylor’s second chamber symphony was commissioned and premiered by the Pasadena Chamber Orchestra in 1983. The Detroit Symphony later performed it in 1990. His various chamber works have been performed throughout the country.
 
Other projects include a trans-tonal pop album entitled Embrace It All (now available on itunes).  A filmmaker as well, he has also completed some short films of his own: the award-winning documentary, Surfing the Sonic, the science fiction short, I I Am Here, as well a documentary about the micro-geometry of subatomic matter with co-director Jesus Trevino called Gurule Shells, A Quantum Metaphor.

Watch Chemical Hearts now on Amazon Prime Video!

 

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