[Fmpro] Composing vs. sound design

[Geoff Koch]

Hello everyone -- I'd like to get your thoughts on where the line between
composer and sound designer lies, and at what point one may have assumed a
dual-role.

I have a client that I've worked with for a number of years, scoring various
tv shows.  The recent trend in tv production style has been a sort of
"MTV-ized" approach -- lots of quick cuts, edits, wipes, flashes, video fx,
etc.  In the beginning, there wasn't much of this "eye candy," but sometimes
for the little that there was, I would throw in some musical fx to
acknowledge it, and the client loved it.

But now, the sheer volume of these video fx have increased immensely, and
the client now wants EVERY one of those video events to be hit with some
sort of musical effect (cymbal, electronic crashes, fx, etc.)  We're talking
hundreds of events to hit per episode, in addition to the normal scoring
duties.  These are not sounds I would otherwise put into a piece of music.

So, two questions for everyone:

1.  Where do you think the line between composer and sound designer lies,
and would you agree that the line has been crossed in the scenario I gave
above?

2.  What would you think a proper response would be for such a situation --
requesting additional compensation for this "added role?"

Many thanks,

Geoff Koch