How to Get Your Music Into Movie Trailers

Being a trailer music composer can be a fun and rewarding career path, both creatively and financially. Trailer music composers are responsible for creating the music that accompanies movie and TV trailers, as well as video game trailers and other promotional materials. The job requires a combination of musical skill, creativity, hard work, and a bit of luck. It's a great feeling to hear your music in a trailer for your favorite movie or video game, but how do you actually get a trailer music placement?

Master Your Craft

Before trying to get your music featured in movie trailers, you need to ensure that your music is of high quality. This means investing time and effort in mastering your craft, creating original and catchy compositions, and ensuring that your music is well-produced. Having great production and mixing skills is essential since you are responsible for the sound you are creating. When working with music publishers, they will most likely only master your tracks, so it's important to deliver a great mix.

Moreover, trailer music is not just epic music. It has its own set of rules that you need to follow. Learning how to arrange trailer music correctly is crucial, following the trailer music formula of Intro, Buildup, Climax, and Outro. Unlike epic music, in trailer music, the dynamics and excitement have to continually rise throughout each act. You achieve this by adding more instruments to the composition over time, incorporating more rhythmic elements, and using sound effects like risers and whoosh-hits. For beginners, we recommend you to check out our inexpensive sound effects library Curiosity.

Work With Music Publishers

Music publishers are professionals who work to promote and pitch your music to potential clients, including movie trailer production companies, also known as trailer houses. Working with music publishers is a crucial part. It is very unlikely to build the connections on your own when you are just starting out. Better spent your time on creating amazing tracks.

So, how do I get to work with music publishers?

Simply apply to them. Send them your demo reel, usually your best three tracks and ask them whether you can write music for future album briefings. It is simple as that and the best part of it is that only your music matters. They don’t care about any following you might have on social media. It is all about the music. Remember that you are dealing with professionals who do this for a living, so be polite and straightforward in your email. If you don’t know any music publishers, you can check out our list of trailer music publishers. Once you work with a music publishers make sure to...

Create a Large Catalog of Music

To increase your chances of getting your music featured in movie trailers, you need to have a large catalog of music available. This means producing many tracks of high quality that can be pitched to trailer houses. We are talking about hundreds of music tracks. Of course, writing that many tracks takes time. Writing between 20-40 tracks per year is a good amount to aim for.

Also, don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Diversify your portfolio by releasing music with a handful of publishers to increase the chances of getting a trailer music placement because, in the end…

It Is About Luck Too

Be persistent and patient. Getting your music featured in movie trailers can be a long and challenging process, and it often requires a bit of luck. That is why having a big music portfolio available increases the chances of getting a lucky golden ticket to a trailer music placement. However, once you have a big music catalog available, it’s not about luck anymore.