“My job is to supply the emotional information so that the person watching the film gets excited, gets scared, gets whatever message the film requires.”

We’re film score geeks here at The Roarbots, and even though Halloween is now in our rearview mirror, you’ll still find us with spooky soundtracks on heavy rotation. And when it comes to the big horror franchises, Charles Bernstein’s score for Wes Craven’s original A Nightmare on Elm Street is second only to John Carpenter’s timeless Halloween theme.

The theme for Elm Street is just as haunting as Halloween‘s, though maybe not as hummable. Nevertheless, it’s still withstood the test of time and is as associated with Freddy Krueger as Carpenter’s theme is with Michael Myers.

Gibson Guitars recently began a new series of videos that take an in-depth look at the creation of groundbreaking music. And in the spirit of the season, their latest video finds composer Charles Bernstein reminiscing about his score for A Nightmare on Elm Street, his experiences on the film, and how he arrived at several of the film’s most memorable sounds.

Bernstein only worked on the first film, but he wrote, recorded, and performed all instruments on the score.

If you’re interested in more great conversations with film composers, check out the following episodes of The Great Big Beautiful Podcast with Kris Bowers, Siddhartha Khosla, Jay Chattaway, Dennis McCarthy, Ron Jones, and Jeff Russo.