Reinhold Heil is still one of the best-known keyboard players in Europe. As a member of legendary bands like "Spliff" or the "Nina Hagen Band" he made a splash in the 80´s and 90´s. He has been living and working in Santa Barbara, CA, as a film composer for various TV-productions. Among other projects he contributed the film score for the internationally successful movie "Lola runs" by Tom Tykwer.

For his latest project, the score for Bernd Eichinger´s blockbuster production "The Perfume", he extended his RME gear pool last year with some RME MADI devices and converters to work on the new material together with the film's director, Tom Tykwer, and with Johnny Klimek. We at RME wish all of them the best of success for this outstanding production!

Reinhold Heil:

"I have been using RME Audio Interfaces for about 5 years now and have nothing but wonderful things to report. I’m running Logic on Apple G5 computers using RME Hammerfall DSP interfaces only. On my main system I just installed the HDSP MADI card with an ADI 648, giving me 64 ins and 64 outs on my all native Logic system. The signal path is extremely simple and as digital as can be: I use the Octamic D with built in A/D converters (I call it the "Purity Box") to record my signals, route the ADAT signal to the MADI interface and straight into Logic. My PCs with Gigastudio 3 also have HDSP cards that are digitally connected to the ADI 648’s inputs into Logic.

The first six outputs of the MADI system are digitally routed to a AD4 DD and converted to AES/EBU. Then they go into the AES/EBU inputs of my monitors, a Dynaudio Air 15 surround system. Each speaker has a D/A converter and amps. This allows for the cleanest signal path I have ever worked with and evokes pure joy. For additional ins and outs I use several ADI-8 DS. In March of 2005 I took a portable HDSP system to Riga/Latvia to record a 50 piece mixed choir for a movie score I’m working on with Tom Tykwer as the director and co composer as well as my composing partner Johnny Klimek. All we brought was an Apple Powerbook G4 running Logic, the Purity Box (Octamic D) and a HDSP PC card with a Multiface. It was very stable and the sound is stunning. We will continue to use this system for small recording sessions on location. The movie, based on a famous German novel, will be out in fall of 2006."

A team of brilliant composers (left to right: Reinhold Heil, Tom Tykwer, Johnny Klimek)

It is certainly unusual for a film director to co-compose the film score for a movie he is directing. Especially in a case like this, where the movie is a multi-million-Dollar blockbuster production like "The Perfume". In Tom Tykwers' movies, the film score always has top priority. In the beginning of his film career there was simply no budget for a professional score composer, therefore he had no alternative but to compose the music himself.

He has been working together with Reinhold Heil and Johnny Klimek since the production of "Winter Sleep" in 1996. This trio, named "Pale 3" had their first worldwide success with "Lola Runs", which received numerous international awards. The trio contributed the song "In Your Head" to the soundtrack for "The Matrix: Revolution".

Recently they faced the demanding challenge of scoring the soundtrack for "The Perfume". For this movie the music had to be classical. The Brandenburg Symphonic Orchestra already had recorded the complete soundtrack in 2005, but the trio decided to re-record the complete score again in 2006 with one of the leading orchestras in the world: The Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. Conducted by Sir Simon Rattle, this orchestra is definitely one of the best addresses when it comes to classical music. And the music is of special importance in this movie: All the odours of 18th-century-Paris had to become "smellable" through the music. And the movie shows in a very convincing way that they were truly successful.