“Every session was very organised, and the top tracks would be from demos recorded years and years ago, done by one producer, and then there would be orchestral session number one done by another producer, then orchestral session number two by yet another producer, a horn section, another horn section, perhaps a third horn section, plus different choirs from different sessions recorded in different cities, and so on!
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As a result the average track count of the sessions was 350-400 tracks! When they gave me the first song, the director told me that I had full control and that I could use everything that was in the session, or some of it, or nothing and start again - anything, as long as I kept the vocals.
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Team photo: from left, composers Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, actor Hugh Jackman, Greg Wells, and director Michael Gracey.“So I have all these diverse experiences that I bring to situations like this, and I indeed needed every bit of experience that I have, because they had been working on the songs for this movie for four years, and had kept everything that had been done. Naturally, people my age were walking by shaking their heads. I was dressed in a goofy tuxedo and had a guy dancing next to me in a French Fry costume.
I recall once, when I was 19, driving 10 hours north of Toronto to perform with a Dixieland band playing at the opening of a take-out French Fries counter. From my end, I have a wide range of experience as a musician, playing in symphony orchestras, punk bands, weddings, and so on. “20th Century Fox had hired several very talented music producers, who were all at the top of their game, but the movie producers found that as much as they loved what these people had done, they did not end up with the choices and changes that were required. It was at this point that things began to get more complicated.
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Eventually, after a brief hold-up to finish another project, he received the Pro Tools session for a song called ‘From Now On’, which he produced and mixed using his established way of working, incorporating the enormous amount of classic analogue gear in his studio and his Eric Valentine-designed 24-channel valve Undertone Audio desk. Greg Wells in his own Rocket Carousel Studio, where most of his work on The Greatest Showman took place.For almost a year, however, Wells heard nothing more. It was an amazing, crazy meeting, and I was completely sold. While he was here, he stood in front of his small laptop and acted out the entire movie for me in two hours, orating the lines of the different characters. Instead I just try and present music in the most vital, true way, and Michael liked that about my approach. Things date well when you try not to follow that stuff. Following the fickle trends of fashion, whether in clothing, music, or whatever, has never really interested me.
I’ve never gone for gimmicky sounds that are going to be dated in two years from now. “According to Michael, the things I do as a record producer pay homage to the classics, but they also are fresh and contemporary, without being gimmicky. He acknowledged it’s potentially a dangerous concoction, because it’s easy to be goofy and ridiculous when you have modern choreography and pop songs in a movie set in 1850. It had to look like a period piece, yet they also wanted it to be fresh. I believe I got on his radar because he was a fan of my work, and he felt that what I did musically corresponded with the visual aesthetic he was pursuing with the movie, which was to make a modern contemporary movie about events that happened in the mid-1800s.
“In the middle of 2016,” says Wells, talking from his Rocket Carousel Studio in Los Angeles, “I had a meeting with film director Michael Gracey, here in my control room. The experience would force him to completely change a production approach developed over decades, and left his cherished collection of vintage outboard gathering dust. However, until he began work on the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack for The Greatest Showman, Greg Wells had never worked on a movie before. He works in a wide range of genres, and plays drums, keyboards, guitar, and several other instruments, with A-list credits including Elton John, Katy Perry, Adele, Timbaland, Pharrell Williams, Celine Dion, Pink, Dua Lipa and many more. Greg Wells has nearly 30 years of top-level experience as a musician, songwriter, engineer, mixer and producer. Greg Wells has worked with everyone who’s anyone in the world of music - but nothing could prepare him for mixing a film soundtrack! Also heavily involved in the musical side of the production was Alex Lacamoire (left), with Greg Wells in this photo from Rocket Carousel.
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