Culture

Whether he’s working with Oscar winners like Natalie Portman on hit streaming series or teaming up with pop icons like Beyoncé for bombastic comeback performances, composer and songwriter Marcus Norris enters every space with his entire self. And his understanding of himself is intrinsically tied to the vast expanse of Blackness. 
Hailing from Jackson, MI — just outside Detroit – and having spent some years in both Chicago and Los Angeles, Norris honed his musical ear and compositional style in three key hubs of Black American music history. Hip-hop is his foundation, with FruityLoops providing him his first entry point into music production. The spirit of the genre courses through all of his projects, from the funky grit of his Southside Symphony to the ominous swagger of his work on Apple TV’s latest hit drama, Lady in the Lake. 

Starring Portman, Emmy nominee Moses Ingram, Noah Jupe, Y’lan Noel, Wood Harris and David Corenswet, Lady in the Lake follows an investigative journalist (Portman) who leaves her abusive husband to solve the mystery of two separate murders that cause her to cross paths with a young woman working to advance Baltimore’s Black community (Ingram). Set in the 1960s, earthy jazz chords and echoes of the blues reverberate across his score, adding both gravity and levity to the series’ plot whenever necessary. 

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Television is a new medium for Norris, but he approaches Lady in the Lake with the same consideration and verve that he brings to live concert orchestrations, like his work with WACO Theater’s annual Wearable Art Gala and Beyoncé’s 2023 Dubai performance. Often his work must balance joy with pain and pride with solemn self-reflection, and it’s a feat that he enjoys pulling off time and time again. 

“Complex emotions and music aren’t difficult, because that’s how people work,” Norris says. “You’re never just one emotion. That’s just the way the human experience is. It’s never hard to translate that through music because that’s how our brains work.” 

Billboard caught up with Norris to break down his Lady in the Lake score, his favorite rap beats and producers of the year, and how he helped Beyoncé’s stunning Dubai performance come to life.

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You started out producing rap beats on pirated software. What was the software you were using? Were you simply trying to recreate beats that you loved or were you already creating original pieces? 

It was called FruityLoops at the time, [but] they rebranded to FL Studio. I was doing both original [beats] and trying to recreate things. It was kind of like a diary for me. I was just making beats and I wasn’t even showing anybody for a year or two. It was my way of processing things.  

If I liked something, I would try to recreate it in FruityLoops to try to figure out how they made those sounds. How did how did Dr. Dre get his drums to sound like that? How did Lil Jon get his sounds to sound like that? I tell all the young producers, “We didn’t have YouTube tutorials back then, you had to just mess with things until you figured it out.” 

What were you listening to when you were growing up? 

My mom is a huge Mary J. Blige fan. I loved Dr. Dre, Tupac, West Coast G-funk. I lived in the South for a year, so UGK too. 

Do you return to any of those touchpoints when you’re crafting new compositions? 

100%. One of my mentors once told me that you are a synthesis of everything that you listen to. I absorb everything and then it kind of comes out as hopefully one cohesive language. 

How did you transition into concert composition? 

I grew up low income, so I had to piece together all of my early starts to music that we were talking about. I didn’t plan to go to college, but after high school, they gave us a two-year free scholarship to a community college. I scoured the Internet and found one that had anything related to music recording. While I was there, I went to Schoolcraft College in Livonia, MI, outside of Detroit.  

While I was there, they made me take music theory and music history. I was exposed to whole styles of music that I had never really been exposed to before. I was bit by the bug I started, [and] studying every piece of music theory I could find, learning more about history and how to write and listen to music. When I was moving to Chicago, I was originally going to go for audio production, but at the last minute, I decided to go for composition, and I just kept doing it ever since. 

Did you have any film or TV compositions that have stuck over the years? 

When I was a kid, I would say the old Alice in Wonderland. There’s just constant music. I think it has the most musical numbers in any Disney film. And also The Nightmare Before Christmas with Danny Elfman. I would just watch those back-to-back. I know my mom was sick of it. [Laughs.] 

What made you say yes to Lady in the Lake? 

[Director] Alma [Ha’rel] and how specific her vision was. I always say I’m interested in the interesting and it’s such an interesting project. Sometimes in modern TV, music has to be very, very background. I joke that music has to be like wallpaper on some things where you don’t quite notice it, but Alma didn’t want that from the jump. She wanted something that was going to be interesting, and she kept using [the word] “iconic.” I’m attracted to these musical puzzles where there are very specific considerations that you have to balance. 

The show is set in 1960s Baltimore. What artists and records did you use as reference points for that era? 

A lot of Nina Simone. I think Cab Calloway is the best performer of all time. I model what I do with Southside Symphony a lot after Cab Calloway. Alma came to me with Nina Simone and talked about her a lot, so I knew that was a touchpoint for it.  

When it comes to creating that eerie ambiance, are there any musical hallmarks you shy away from because they might be too cliché? 

I just go on a case-by-case basis. Sometimes you can do a familiar thing in an unfamiliar context and that kind of helps. I think when you’re doing the same thing in the same way, that’s when it [becomes] an issue.  

For this score specifically, we did try some weird things. We took a trumpet and put it underwater and that was cool. A lot of the sounds that people hear are actually familiar, like breathing or whistling. Usually, you might whistle a happy tune or something, but here it’s kind of creepy. 

Ms. Tina Knowles selected you to music direct the 2022 Wearable Art Gala. What was that experience like, especially working with artists like Chloe x Halle and Andra Day? 

It was amazing. Ms. Tina is another visionary. It was inspiring to help her bring that vision to life, and I’ve been working with the WACO theater family for some years. I was honored to have the chance to do this on the biggest thing that they had done at [the] time. Working with Chloe x Halle was amazing, [likewise with] Andra Day and Adrienne Warren. 

You also got a chance to work with Beyoncé herself for her 2023 Dubai performance. If there were any challenges, what were the biggest ones with bringing that particular set to life? 

Just the timing and how quick the turnaround is, but I’ve noticed that that’s all of the music industry. That’s the film and TV industry too, that’s just what being a professional is. It was a very quick turnaround.  

Funnily enough, I didn’t actually get to go to Dubai! I did some work for them before they went over there, but the reason I couldn’t go to Dubai was because we were recording the Southside Symphony live mixtape at the same at Ms. Tina’s theater, and she had set it up for us. If it was any other thing in the world, I would have quit and [gone] to Dubai. But it’s like… her mom’s totally gonna know! 

What specific orchestrations did you contribute to? 

One that was really inspiring for me and kind of a full-circle moment was the arrangement I did for Schubert’s “Ave Maria.” In the [late] 2000s, she did a remix of “Ave Maria,” but she actually did Schubert’s “Ave Maria” in Dubai. I remember thinking, “What an amazing artist.” She’s doing this just to show you she can do it. She doesn’t have to do this, [she’s] already Beyoncé and could take her victory lap. But she’s still pushing it further.  

As somebody who draws from so many influences, being able to orchestrate Schubert’s “Ave Maria” for Beyoncé just felt like I was in the right place at the right time. It was a Slumdog Millionaire moment for me. 

When did you start working on the Dubai set? 

I think [I started] in January of 2023. I was back in the Midwest for the holidays and at the same time, I’m finishing my PhD. I still had to do my defense, so I’m not even done with school. I was getting ready for the live mixtape recording and another film, and Ms. Tina called me directly and said, “Marcus, what are you up to these days?” Knowing all these things that I have going on, I just flat out lied like, “Nothing!” She’s like, “Beyoncé is working on this project and I told her I just really think she needs you on that.” She asked me if I would be interested, and I was like, “Of course!” 

My part was very short. I got to sprinkle some things on top and I was just so honored to be a part of such an exciting and inspiring experience. 

When did you first start working with Ms. Tina on the Wearable Art Gala? 

I’ve been scoring plays at the WACO theater in North Hollywood since 2018. I remember the first time I talked with Miss Tina, we did the very first Southside Symphony concert there in 2020.  

The first time I spoke with her more directly was about a little play [the theater] did. I loved working on it, we worked on the music for weeks and weeks. She came up to me afterward – this was when she didn’t direct, she just did the costumes or something for it – and she was like, “I just want you to know they did this play a few years ago, and it wasn’t as good without you.” I just remember thinking, “Ms. Tina, do you know who your children are?” [Laughs]. You can’t say that to people, it’s going to go to my head! At this point, the whole WACO theater is really like family. 

What was the biggest challenge for you in composing a TV series versus a concert? What’s one upside that you weren’t anticipating? 

I think the biggest challenge on a brand new TV series is that you’re still figuring out what the thing is. The composer’s job is to balance all of these different viewpoints and find a way to make them singular. There are studios, the director, writers, producers, and my musicians and engineers, and all of these different elements. I have to hear all of those and then put them into one singular idea versus the concert I just say, “Hey, this is going to sound great.” Bam, thumbs up. 

Every composer who makes it to this point is really good at making music, that’s the easy part. It’s more about how you navigate all of these different personalities. And that’s also the upside, working in that collaborative way. Hopefully, when it goes well, it’s bigger than the sum of its parts. I definitely feel like I got a good workout on that muscle, and I’m excited to do more. 

Who are your favorite rap producers or your favorite beats you’ve heard this year? Who are your favorite composers across mediums from this year? 

I think Tay Keith has never made a bad beat. I really like Tricky Stewart, even though he’s R&B. I’m a big fan of him and The-Dream, those are some of my dream collaborators. I  think they make timeless music. Bryan-Michael Cox is another R&B one. I love the “Euphoria” beat from Kendrick [Lamar]. It goes on these different journeys. My dream is to play “Euphoria” with Southside Symphony just for L.A. 

For composers across the board, John Williams is our God. I really like Bernard Herrmann, I feel like I’m very influenced by him as far as my scores go. [Maurice] Ravel is probably one of my favorite orchestrators, I think he’s just a master. I kind of go through these phases where I’m obsessed with a composer or a genre, and I spend a lot of time with it. Right now I’m in a Rimsky-Korsakov phase. I said that Cab Calloway is my favorite performer of all time, a very close second is James Brown. I’ve been listening to Soul on Top right now, those horns are just magic.