Sony Music has digitally released the GUNPOWDER – Original Television Soundtrack. The album features the TV series’ original score by Oscar-nominated composer Volker Bertelmann, also known as Hauschka. The series, which stars Kit Harrington of Game of Thrones, premiered Monday, December 18, 2017 on HBO.
“Working on Gunpowder with the great director J Blakeson was a pleasure. The topic of this TV series is pretty violent at times and it was not always easy to find the right tonality, but the collaborative process with J was great and productive because it had clarity. I am very pleased with the result,” says Volker of his work on the score.
Volker Bertelmann (aka Hauschka) is a composer, songwriter and experimental musician who uses prepared piano as his primary instrument. The prepared piano refers to the technique of resting pieces of paper, marbles, drumsticks and other objects on the strings to produce odd, sometimes randomly generated sounds, that move the instrument in unexpected directions.
Hauschka’s other recent score jobs include James Franco’s In Dubious Battle (2016), based on the 1936 novel by John Steinbeck which describes the movement to unionize fruit workers in California; Deutschland Dein Selbstporträt (2016), a unique portrait of the country and its people by Sönke Wortmann and another documentary, Exodus (2016) by Hank Levine which explores the current refugee crises with individual stories.