Description
SFFILM Education will host filmmaker Mohammad Gorjestani and composer William Ryan Fritch for a music and film workshop for teens ages 13–18. Taking a deeper look at the relationship between filmmakers and composers, Mo and Will will lead students on a master class on sound and music in film. The team will show their film Exit 12, and give a presentation on their respective careers in composing and filmmaking. A conversation will follow to explore their artistic processes as they develop a common language around music in their films. Teens will learn about careers in film production, music, and composition, and have the opportunity to speak directly with the film team.
This workshop is designed for ages 13–18.
Mohammad Gorjestani was born in Tehran, Iran and immigrated to the United States during the Iran-Iraq War. As a filmmaker, he mines the resilient narratives of marginalized characters and communities across both narrative and documentary projects. In 2014, his near-future drama, “Refuge”, was selected to screen at the Tribeca and SXSW Film Festivals. Refuge earned him a place on Filmmaker Magazine’s 25 New Faces of Independent Film in 2014. He has earned 9 Vimeo Staff Picks for his short films and has been featured by outlets including CNN, The Guardian, and The Atlantic. In 2018, his film “Sister Hearts”, part of the “For Every Dream” series commissioned by Square earned the Tribeca X Award, a Silver Clio Award for Directing, and was nominated for a Cinema Eye Honor. He is a 2x KRF Filmmaking grant recipient from SFFILM and is currently developing his first feature film. He is based in San Francisco where he is also a co-founder of Even/Odd, a creative studio and production company.
William Ryan Fritch is a composer, multi-instrumentalist, and producer living in Petaluma, California. He has scored and/or contributed music to over a hundred documentary and narrative films, many of which have been celebrated by festivals and organizations such as The Independent Spirit award winning “The Waiting Room” and the 2016 Academy Award and Emmy nominated documentary “4.1 Miles.” In addition to his commissioned film work, his music has been licensed and featured in numerous features, shows, and limited series for Netflix, HBO, Amazon, AMC, CBS, IFC, Showtime, Discovery, and PBS. As a recording artist, he has maintained a prolific career since 2008, releasing more than 30 solo albums of his unique amalgam of folk, contemporary classical, and experimental music through the boutique label Lost Tribe Sound. His distinctly textural and organic sound is the product of utilizing and manipulating a vast array of strictly live, acoustic, and analog instrumentation to fully realize his compositions.