Renowned music composer Fred Story, founder of Concentrix Music and Sound Design, Inc., has announced his company’s latest projects across a number of film, TV, radio and streaming platforms.
Regarding his latest accomplishments, Story said, “Thanks to my eclectic musical upbringing, I love the opportunity to work in so many musical styles. My Dad and his brothers were great bluegrass musicians and I grew up with that music. I fell in love with classical music in grade school – and jazz in high school. In college, I played in cover bands and piano bars and was even a club deejay. I’ve been a musician in orchestras, big bands, rock bands and country bands; I’ve played funk, R&B and world music. It’s all been nourishment for my musical soul. As a composer, all these experiences allow me to write in a variety of styles from the inside – as someone who’s been on stage and in the studio making that music happen. Whatever the genre, it’s about doing it credibly…digging in to make sure the musical choices serve the material and contribute to the emotional impact.”
Details of Story’s most recent projects are as follows:
- For a new documentary film entitled “Double Take: The Art of Elizabeth King,” Story composed original music – a hybrid score for electronic instruments and a string quartet. The Bechtler Ensemble recorded Story’s score at Concentrix Studios. The film is slated for an April 2018 release.
“Double Take: The Art of Elizabeth King” engages the viewer in the work of sculptor and stop-action animator Elizabeth King, who embarks on each new project by posing a single question to herself: “How/Can this be physically done?” Tracing King’s creative flow, curiosity and obsessive drive to solve the inevitable series of artistic and technical problems that arise in creating her disconcerting sculptures and animations, balanced between realism and surrealism, the film explores King’s interest in automatons and puppetry, and the role of gesture and the body in her work.
For this project, Concentrix’s client was Durham, NC-based Producer/Director Olympia Stone and her company, Floating Stone Productions. Regarding Story’s contributions to her film, Stone said, “Working with Fred is a total pleasure! He manages to be completely ego-free, and his instincts for what the music needed to be for our film, how to illustrate it with his score, was always spot on. He comes up with the most beautiful music, not to mention the fact that he’s an incredibly creative and kind person – very generous of spirit. His music has enhanced my film 200% – it’s added so much. I feel very lucky to have worked with him.”
- For the syndicated radio program zMax Racing Country from PRN (the Performance Racing Network), Story is currently working on an upcoming theme music package which will feature Nashville musicians.
zMax Racing Country, now in its 27th year, is a weekly, two-hour, music intensive variety show featuring insights and interviews from behind the scenes of NASCAR and Nashville. zMax Racing Country reaches millions of listeners weekly, playing the best selection of country music and original interviews straight from the NASCAR Garage and Nashville recording studios.
For this project, Concentrix’s client is Speedway Motorsports, Inc., and zMax Racing Country’s show producers Kelly Watts and Doug Rice. Regarding Story’s work, Rice said, “Fred is always able to interpret our wishes and turn them into reality. He has always furnished PRN with the highest quality music imaginable.”
- Story and Concentrix have just created and delivered a new package of background music for client Wells Fargo. The new music, described as contemporary, soft rock and smooth jazz, will be heard by customers in 6,000 Wells Fargo banking stores, coast to coast. This is the sixth consecutive year for which Story/Concentrix have provided Wells Fargo with this background, in-store music. Wells Fargo recently ran a profile of Story on their website: https://stories.wf.com/the-best-music-ever-heard-in-a-bank/
In addition to Story having written most of the music himself, an additional one dozen composers from around the country also contributed to this new initiative as well.
For this project, Concentrix’s client was Dave Warlick, Corporate Communications, Wells Fargo, who is based in Charlotte, NC. Regarding Story’s new music, Warlick said,
“There are two important points in working with Fred: when doing music for us – he has always been extremely responsive to the feedback we give him from our internal partners and marketing research about our customers. He’s really attentive to that and gets the exact sound we’re looking for. Another of his strongest points is his ability to talk to people who are not musicians and understand the feelings and goals they are trying to achieve. He can then translate that input and reflect it back into his music through the musicians he’s working with to record a new score. I’ve worked with Fred for a long time, and he’s absolutely fabulous.”
- Story contributed his work as a string arranger on a new studio contemporary Christian single from Elevation Worship, written by songwriter/composer Aaron Robertson. The new song, which was mixed in Nashville, will be released soon. For this project, Story supervised a remote recording session with The Bow Tie Orchestra in Moscow, one of the best symphony orchestras in Russia. The orchestra, which was formed specifically for online remote recordings, was conducted by Vladimir Podgoretsky.
Based in Charlotte, NC, Elevation Worship is the group name given to a series of album releases related to the Elevation Church located in Charlotte, North Carolina. The first Elevation Worship release, “Live Worship,” was released in 2006. In 2016, Elevation had their greatest success yet, releasing a live album, “Here As In Heaven,” which debuted at the top of the Billboard Christian chart and broke into the Top 20. To date, Elevation Worship has 13 albums available on Apple iTunes.
For the new studio single project, Concentrix’s client was Garrett Davis, Head of Audio Engineering, for Elevation Worship. He said, “Fred took our orchestration and arranged it perfectly to fit in with a real orchestra and helped facilitate the session. He’s a great guy to work with, and he cares a lot about his craft. We love Fred.”
- Story recently did the audio post production and mix for a new TV pilot entitled “Paint,” which made its debut at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival, in the festival’s new “Indie Episodic” category.
“Paint” is a half-hour comedy/drama that follows the adventures and exploits of three young artists living in Brooklyn, as they struggle to make it not only in the art world but in life.
For “Paint,” Concentrix’s client was director Michael Walker. Previously, Story had also done all of the audio post production and mixing for another of Walker’s films, entitled “Cut Shoot Kill.” Walker's earlier directing credits include “Price Check,” which featured Parker Posey and Amy Schumer, and “Chasing Sleep,” which starred Jeff Daniels. Regarding “Paint,” Walker said, “Concentrix and Fred Story did the post sound work and final mix for my last two projects. Although I was working from New York most of the time, Fred did an excellent job down in North Carolina. He is great to work with, has a ton of experience, and is very quick and responsive to notes. I was with Fred in N.C. for the final mix of my feature film – his facility is top notch and his work is equal to or better than anyone I could find in New York.”
- Story recently scored, and Concentrix recently provided the audio post production and mix for, a new documentary entitled “A Spark of Nerve.” That film has just become available for streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
“A Spark of Nerve” is the story of a brutally stabbed teenage girl and other desperate patients who find hope with Dr. Susan Mackinnon and her pioneering nerve transfer surgeries. The St. Louis-based Dr. Mackinnon is renowned for restoring movement to limbs that many other doctors believe to be permanently paralyzed.
For this project, Concentrix’s client was the San Francisco-based Fogline Features, and the film’s co-directors Linda and Tim Schaller. Regarding Story’s contributions to “A Spark of Nerve,” Linda Schaller said, “’Serendipity’ on all levels surrounded our amazing experience with Fred Story on this project. We were introduced by a mutual friend via email since we live on opposite coasts. When we sent him a copy of our rough cut to preview, it was Fred’s incredibly intuitive response that made us decide he was the right composer and audio mixer for us – he completely got it. Working by long distance, Fred made us truly comfortable with this process at every stage. We didn't even meet him in person until the film festival premiere. Our score is outstanding. And so is Fred!”
- Finally, Story has recently composed and produced the original score for an upcoming biographical documentary entitled “Robert Shaw: Man of Many Voices.” The documentary was the recent winner of the “Best Music” Award at the prestigious Breckinridge Film Festival, and also won “Best Documentary Film” at that same event.
Story’s original score, written for a chamber string ensemble, was performed by The Bechtler Ensemble, with Alan Yamamoto serving as conductor. The documentary was mentioned by the New York Times in an article honoring Robert Shaw’s remarkable career: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/28/arts/music/saluting-robert-shaw-a-conductor-of-humanist-spirituality.html
Story’s client for this project was the program’s executive producer Kiki Wilson, a longtime member of the Atlanta Symphony Chorus, and Directors Pamela Roberts and Peter Miller. Regarding Story’s work on “Man of Many Voices,” Wilson said, “Fred is unbelievably wonderful to work with in general. The way he works, his speed for turning things around, and the quality that he produces is just terrific. Anybody who took on original music for a film like this – a documentary jam-packed with some of the greatest classic pieces of music of the past century – would be facing a daunting task. But Fred did it wonderfully. His music balances so nicely with those classic original recordings, which were very high quality. I would work with him again in a heartbeat – he’s just a delight to work with, and an exceptional human being.”
About Fred Story
Fred Story is President/Composer of Concentrix Music and Sound Design, Inc., of Charlotte, NC. Story has been composing for film, television, and advertising since 1990. Since that time, he has scored dozens of independent feature films and documentaries. In addition, his music for television has been heard on major network and cable outlets including PBS, ABC, Discovery, A&E, History Channel, HGTV, Food Network, and more, as well as on numerous regional public TV affiliates across the country. Films scored by Story consistently receive honors at major film festivals.
Having majored in Music Education in college, Story next found himself in a career in broadcasting, and relocated to Charlotte in the early 1980s to work at an album rock radio station. What began as an effort to improve his jazz piano chops turned instead into seven years of private study in composition with the great Ziggy Hurwitz (who’d written, arranged and performed with everyone from Woody Herman to the London Symphony), during which time Story focused on orchestral writing. His broadcast industry connections next led him to numerous scoring opportunities, and his demand as a composer flourished. In 1990, Story left the radio industry and launched Concentrix.
In addition to his most recent projects cited above, Story has also contributed original music to such TV programs as “Red October” for Discovery, “Pope John Paul II – A Light for the Nations” originally for ABC Network, “Food Finds” on Food Network (for which he was the composer for seven seasons,) and for the PBS programs “Margaret Mitchell: American Rebel,” “Thank You Eddie Hart,” “Marching Once More” and “Laugh At Us.” Fred and his wife Becky, an Emmy Award winning lyricist, composed songs and score and managed the music team for 195 episodes of the international children’s show “Raggs”. He also contributed the scores to a number of feature and documentary films, including “A Man Named Pearl” (a film which the New York Times said was “aided by Fred Story’s jazzy score”), as well as the films “Children of all Ages,” “In the Footsteps of Elie Weisel,” “War Bonds: The Songs and Letters of World War II,” “Redneck Roots,” “Among Brothers,” “Fudgie and Jane,” “Liberating Jesse” and “Saying Goodbye.”
Story is the winner of 14 Regional Emmy Awards, as well as four Telly Awards, 18 Addy Awards, a “Best Music” New York Festival Award, a Cine Golden Eagle Award, a “Best Music” Breckenridge Film Festival Award, and dozens of Silver Microphone Awards. He is a member of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, ASCAP, NATAS, and the Production Music Association.
About CONCENTRIX MUSIC & SOUND DESIGN
Founded by Fred Story in Charlotte, NC, in 1990, Concentrix Music and Sound Design, Inc., is a leading, original music production company spearheaded by Story, and owned and managed by Story and his wife Becky.
Regarding the origin of his company’s name, Story says, “Sound moves in concentric circles. But the laws of physics don’t explain how sound can and does elicit emotion. Our specialty at Concentrix Music is to help create emotion through sound. We provide original music and audio production for film, television, radio, advertising, streaming, and multi-media presentations across the United States and beyond.”
For more information, please see: www.concentrixmusic.com
