Composer James Venable is showing that there’s more to cartoon music than meets the ear. The percussion major has been scoring shows for Cartoon Network since the mid 1990s, and has been the principal composer for the popular POWERPUFF GIRLS series since 1998. He recently migrated to the big screen, with a larger-than-life score for the live-action cartoon, JAY AND SILENT BOB STRIKE BACK, and synthesized Asian tonalities for the remixed Hong Kong actioner IRON MONKEY. Venable had begun playing drums in high school rock bands until the advent of percussion synthesizers and drum machines got him thinking about further directions in electronic composition and performance. "While I was studying with Lyle ‘Spud’ Murphy, I was still doing the whole synthesizer and electronica thing," Venable recalled. "I realized that I really wasn’t drawn to writing lyrics, so I wondered where would I have my music played. It didn’t take me long to realize that I’ve always dug film music, and that would be the perfect place to try to break in." Venable also studied with Jack Smalley and John "Terry" Tirabasso, and is a graduate of Fred Karlin’s ASCAP Film Scoring Workshop. After gaining some experience scoring student and independent films for AFI and USC, Venable secured some ghostwriting assignments. That eventually led to his first Hollywood credit, Cartoon Network’s clever POWERPUFF GIRLS series, which he quickly made his own. From there he was off and running. With something of a return to his roots with this summer’s THE POWERPUFF GIRLS MOVIE, Venable seems primed to take his TV cartoon evocations to further realms.

Interview by Randall D. Larson