Bini Hill playing music

Knowing the Score

By Bini Hill '24

"Music has undeniably shaped me as a human being."

 

I was born in Ethiopia to a deeply religious family who didn’t listen to secular music. When I was almost four, after a year in an orphanage, I was adopted and moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts. Being adopted and brought to a completely new country where the language made no sense definitely scared me. Seeing an escalator for the first time petrified me. To make matters worse, I was used to warm weather, with average temperatures in the 80s. You can probably guess my reaction when I stepped outside in February in Massachusetts—there was dandruff falling from the freezing sky. Nothing comforted me. My parents didn’t look like me, and no one spoke my language. I needed something to break this barrier. 

map of world with Ethiopia to Cambridge, MA

It only took a few days for me to fall in love with music. “Wannabe” by the Spice Girls is a catchy song. I had no idea what they were saying, but I felt something akin to magic. But isn’t that what music really is? Their music made me feel something, but I didn’t know what it was. In no time, I was jumping on the couch grooving to fire beats, and yelling songs from the back seat of the car, even though I had no idea what I was saying.

Spice Girls album cover Wannabe

UP Movie poster

About a month after arriving in Boston, I saw Up, my first movie in a theater, and I fell in love again—this time with movies. You might think watching this movie would be pointless since I couldn’t recognize English, but I understood the stories through the music and the animation. There’s a montage where there is no dialogue, allowing the music to speak for itself. The soundtrack captured our love language so perfectly. Despite not speaking the language, I became infatuated with movies that day because of the way the film and the music intertwined to tell the story.

While loving music and movies was easy, school was difficult for me. I was diagnosed with dyslexia when I was in second grade and transferred to a school for dyslexic kids the next year. My music teacher introduced me to GarageBand, and it changed my world. I was able to create the music I kept hearing. As time passed, I became more articulate with music and began to improve the quality of my compositions.

Years later, during the summer of 2020, I took a course on film scoring at Hartt School of Music, and I finally understood what I wanted to do with music. Watching movies and seeing how drastically music changes a scene has always impressed me. Now I spend my free time stripping trailers and movie scenes of their original score and composing new scores for the scenes because I love how it can completely change their entire feel. 

Music can make us laugh, become emotional, motivate us, or even cause feelings of anger. Music connects me to people who have nothing in common with me. It has always evoked different emotions within me. It never made me feel just one thing; it never made me feel just joyful or just sad. It brought out all my emotions, and that’s why I love it. I want to be able to do that myself. I want to be a professional media composer to give my audience the gift of that special feeling. 

I love being able to evoke emotions through my music, and the best way to do that for me is by scoring trailers. In addition to scoring, I play in a rock band at school and compose my own songs. Music brings me happiness and makes my life fuller. My dream is to be able to use my passion to bring joy to others the same way it has brought joy to me. 

Article originally published in The Lantern Fall/Winter 2024.

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