Score to Screen with Jeff Russo (Fargo Year 4)

Score to Screen

Jeff Russo is the featured guest on this Score to Screen podcast. The returning Fargo composer, previously working on the last 3 installments, reflects on how he crafted the Season 4 score starting from scratch with just the script to sketch ideas for various themes that capture each character, the time period and the vast array of stories.

In 1950 Kansas City, the fourth installment of Fargo centers on two criminal syndicates who are fighting for a piece of the American dream and have struck an uneasy peace. Together, they control an alternate economy of exploitation, graft and drugs. To cement their truce, Loy Cannon (Chris Rock), the head of the African American crime family, trades his youngest son Satchel (Rodney Jones), to his enemy Donatello Fadda (Tomasso Ragno), the head of the Italian mafia. In return, Donatello surrenders his youngest son Zero (Jameson Braccioforte) to Loy. Intertwined with this tale of immigration, assimilation, and power, are the stories of Josto Fadda (Jason Schwartzman), the impulsive and self-indulgent heir apparent to the Fadda Crime Family; Donatello’s adopted son Rabbi Milligan (Ben Whishaw); Detective Odis Weff (Jack Huston); Oraetta Mayflower (Jessie Buckley); Ethelrida Pearl Smutny (E’myri Crutchfield), the precocious 16-year-old daughter of Thurman (Andrew Bird) and Dibrell Smutny (Anji White) and U.S. Marshal Dick “Deafy” Wickware (Timothy Olyphant).

Jeff Russo is an Emmy® Award–winning and Grammy-nominated composer, scoring varied and compelling music for film, television, and video games. He won an Emmy Award and received two additional Emmy nominations for his thrilling and angst-producing score on FX’s Golden Globe and Emmy-winning Fargo. Russo also received a BAFTA nomination for Best Music for Annapurna Interactive’s video game What Remains of Edith Finch. Russo’s film credits include Lucy in the Sky, Lizzie, Mile 22, and Three Christs. Russo recently scored season 4 of Fargo and season 3 of CBS All Access’ Star Trek: Discovery. He’s currently scoring season 2 of Apple TV+’s For All Mankind and Starz’s Power Book II: Ghost, a sequel to Power. His music can also be heard on shows such as Netflix’s Cursed, Altered Carbon, The Umbrella Academy and Lucifer; CBS All Access’s Star Trek: Picard; FX’s Legion and Snowfall; Starz’s Counterpart; HBO’s Golden Globe– and Emmy-nominated series The Night Of. In addition to composing music for film and television, Russo is a founding member, lead guitarist, and co-songwriter of two-time Grammy-nominated, multi-platinum-selling rock band Tonic. Their debut album, Lemon Parade, posted three singles in the U.S. Mainstream rock charts’ Top 10, with “If You Could Only See” rocketing to number one. In 2003, the band received two Grammy nominations, one for “Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal” for “Take Me As I Am,” and one for Best Rock Album.

The Score to Screen podcast series is produced and hosted by Crossover Media's Max Horowitz.

Listen to the Fargo Year 4 Soundtrack here.

Listen to the official Jeff Russo Spotify playlist here.

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