Copyright ©2013-2021 Andrew Ernst

12 Scores of Christmas


Spitfire Audio invited composers to create a festive song of 59 seconds or less as part of their celebration of the season. I found some inspiring video from Pexels.com and cut together a little video and then wrote this short Christmasy song. It’s the first time I’ve had Davinci Resovle open in 2021, and reminded me that my video editing skills need to be practiced continually. Instruments: 8DIO – Acoustic Grand Ensembles I & II Fracture Sounds – Sleighbells Spitfire Audio – Abbey Road Two Spitfrie Audio – Bernard Herrmann Composers Toolkit Spitfire Audio – Olafur Arnalds Composers Toolkit Spitfire […]

Westwood Lost Piano Scoring Competition


I recently submitted my entry into the Lost Piano Scoring Competition, sponsored by Westwood. I was inspired to create a more intimate score, which was a challenging and rewarding experience. My goal was to avoid accentuating the frustrations, but instead, imagined the protagonist having music in his mind while exploring his childhood home. When he finally discovers the piano, perhaps memories of childhood piano lessons come back, and we complete the film with his attempt to reconnect with that song from his childhood, and play it on the lost piano as the credits roll. I hope you enjoy my entry: […]

Who Should Decide?


Scoring music to picture is such a rewarding way for me to be creative despite being time-challenged outside of my regular daytime career. I’ve been on a journey rediscovering music and composing over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, playing and recording music almost every day. I tend to be way better at multi-hour jam sessions than tracking and recording songs, but when it comes to music composition for film, I really enjoy the creative process of writing and adapting music to fit the mood and structure of the visuals. I decided to enter the Music Cosmos Composer Competition and […]

Music Cosmos Composer Competition 2021

Celebrate Composers Day 2021


We took a moment on September 15 to come together and celebrate composers around the world. Composer Magazine commissioned some small animations and asked the composing community to take some time and develop some ideas and upload them to get the hashtag #Composers trending in celebration. I was able to develop two short cues and put them out there — one being a bit more synth-heavy and the other being mellow and relaxing. It was amazing to see all the different ways people chose to bring their own vision and sonic identity to the work. That’s the most exciting part […]

Spitfire Audio Stargirl Scoring Competition


This is my original composition entry for the Spitfire Audio STARGIRL Scoring Competition 2021. A bit thank you to Spitfire Audio, Pinar Toprak, DC, CW and Mad Ghost Productions for the opportunity to participate in this competition. Any opportunities to blend music, video, composition and the challenge of working with a scene having such varied dynamics (action, relief, tension, sorrow) and finding ways to weave my creativity was a welcome. I wish everyone in the competition the best of luck, and it’s been really enjoyable to listen to other people’s impressions of the same scene!

SELENE Rescore


Creativity brews joy! When Spitfire Audio released Albion Solstice, they also created a short film directed by Lee Kirby called “SELENE“. When they offered an opportunity to artists to rescore the film, I jumped right in and really enjoyed the creative process of bringing my own interepretive vision to this visually stunning film. I honestly can’t believe how many intruments I brought to bear on this composition, but can honestly say that I enjoyed every minute of it! Well, I did find mixing and mastering a bit tedious, but I really hope you enjoy it! This film was inspired by […]

What’s Brewing (October 2016)


his has been a pretty wonderful year for coffee.  Right now, I have some goodies from Kuma Coffee here in Seattle.  I’m brewing up a washed Kenya Mugaya which is a juicy and tart SL28, SL34 mix from Kirinyaga.  Also lining my coffee drawer is a bag of their absolutely delicious natural processed Ethiopia Wenago.  It’s so distinct and fruit-forward, as is the case with many naturals from Ethiopia, but this particular offering from Kuma was a stand-out for me in 2016. My Colombian coffee hails from Narino and is roasted by Sweet Bloom in Colorado. Every time I look […]

Visit: Elm Coffee Roasters, Seattle, WA


I believe it was about a year ago that I first heard about the Elm Coffee Roasters cafe opening up in Pioneer Square, and I made note to go down and check them out.  If you’re like me, I tend to make note of things, and then put them off in typical procrastinator style.  Fast forward to April 17, 2016 – a day which involved visits to three separate cafes (though, one of them closing about five minutes before we arrived). I wasn’t completely sure where Elm was located, but their on-street signage was easy to spot.  It was unusually […]

Coffee Brewing This Week (Feb 15-22, 2016)


This week is a good one for sampling coffee.  I currently have the following bags on the go: George Howell Rwanda Kanzu George Howell Kenya Mamuto AA Sightglass Ethiopia Wanja Qarsa Jimma (espresso profile) Sightglass Indonesia Cempaka Mulya Village Copa Vida Ethiopia Guji It’s a fine selection, but the Mamuto AA keeps me coming back for 19-23g of beans at least once a day.  This is simply put, one of the best coffees I’ve had over the last year.  There’s no wonder that this is my third bag of AA, and when combined with the Mamuto Christmas Box which contained […]

Let’s Tell the FCC that Network Neutrality is Important


’ve been pretty fortunate over the years, to have very good connectivity to the Internet.  When I was in University, I had the very first Ethernet-connected dorm room, while my friends continued to dial-up using their 28.8k or 56.6k modems.  When I moved to my first apartment on McLean street in Halifax, I was one of the early adopters of ADSL technology with their MT&T MpoweredPC roll-out.  At one point in time, my house had two DS-1 lines from both Allegiant and Qwest so that I could serve up web sites for a few personal customers, back when hosting plans […]