Hamline graduates can be found all over, but one of the more unique places to find alumni is on Netflix’s top trending page. That’s where Steve Gernes’s work was last fall, as co-composer of the four-part docuseries "Live to 100: Secrets of the Blue Zones," which debuted Aug. 30, 2023.
Fast-forward 10 months and Gernes, along with co-composers Duncan Thum and Tyler Sabbag, were awarded with the Outstanding Music Direction and Composition Daytime Emmy for their work on “Live to 100” at the the Creative Arts and Lifestyle Emmy Award ceremony held on June 8.
“It felt like a culmination of all the work we’ve done together,” Gernes, who graduated with a degree in music theory and composition in 2010, said of the Emmy win with Thum and Sabbag. “It was really special, considering we’ve made so much music together all these years.”
Years before Gernes started composing with his longtime collaborators, he entered Hamline University as an undeclared student who took a wide variety of classes, but always had a special interest in music.
“I was always into music before college, into the tech and gear part of it,” he said. “I never had formal training for writing for traditional acoustic instruments, so that was all new to me and it was really eye-opening working with faculty on that.”
After graduation, Gernes moved to Los Angeles to attend the Scoring for Motion Pictures and Television program at the University of Southern California, where he met his current collaborators. While many fellow students at USC came from more rigorous, music-specific institutions and conservatories, Gernes felt the liberal arts education at Hamline helped him succeed in other ways.
“I wouldn’t trade the experience I had at Hamline for any technical music college or rigorous composition school. I think a liberal arts education is extremely valuable and I had such great faculty at Hamline,” Gernes said. “The Hamline music department faculty were so open and nurturing toward a non-conforming music student like myself in terms of the classic musical path. I didn’t really fit into the classical composition or performance path, I came from a very DIY electronic background. All the faculty support I had at Hamline really set me up to be comfortable with where I was coming from and going. Hamline made me comfortable with always learning and trying to do new things”
After finishing the USC program, Gernes started frequently collaborating on projects with Thum and Sabbag, among others. Collaboration, Gernes said, helps composers deal with the tight deadlines and tough pressure they receive, as soundtrack composition is usually one of the final steps in the production process.
“On TV and film projects, the timelines and schedules are so cramped, so it can be fairly impossible for one person to do all the composing,” Gernes said. “We’ll start ideas, pass them around, and then the other people will work on it and it gets passed around again and everybody gets their hands on it and gets their ideas in.”
Gernes, who recently moved back to St. Paul, now collaborates virtually on projects – including “Live to 100,” which, in addition to the Emmy recognition, is also Gernes’ most heard work.
“I’ve worked on a bunch of other stuff, but this turned out to be the most high-profile project,” he said. “It did really well on Netflix, as a show it has very broad appeal.”
In addition to more Netflix work, Gernes is currently finishing up an 10-track soundtrack album for a Dungeons and Dragons campaign, Obojima Tales From The Tall Grass.
“It’s a Studio Ghibli, Legend of Zelda-style orchestral album,” Gernes said. “That’s some of my favorite styles of music, so it’s been sort of a dream pursuit. It’s been super fun.”
