CH: Speaking of the song (“Cateura: Vamos a Soñar (We Will Dream)”), how did that come together and how does that tie back thematically to the score itself?

MAL: Well, the lyrics of the song are based on things that Favio said, and it is pulled from the viewpoint of the kids in the orchestra. A number of lines come specifically from him addressing the audience in the very last scene in the movie, so the idea was to do something that felt a little bit like a South American piece but a contemporary pop song at the same time. It’s in English and in Spanish. My daughter, Mariana Barreto—technically my step-daughter, although I never think of her that way—her first language was Spanish. She wrote the initial Spanish lyrics, based on some ideas that I had. The lyrics were divided by a number of people, but most notably Mariana.

I took the music from that and it’s woven throughout the score as a theme. For example, if you listen to the song, then you listen to the opening of the film, which sounds very different in terms of rhythm, color and so forth, you realize it’s the same tune—it’s just much slower and very different in instrumentation. That happens again and again, so the heart of Cateura is what the song represents.

Favio said that everybody has the right to dream. That’s the hardest part, I think, about being really poor, is that you are told directly or indirectly, from the time you’re an infant, that you don’t have the right to dream, that your life is going to be stuck wherever it is you are. Favio said, “No.” There are variations of the chorus, but it says, “Cateura, come with me, Cateura, we will succeed, Cateura, here we live, we will fly, we will fly, we will dream,” and it plays off a little in Spanish. It means “we will fly” and “we will dream.” It rather summarizes my feeling about it.

CH: You also performed the song live in concert with the orchestra this past September at New York’s Trinity Church. What was that experience like?

MAL: It was so much fun. A good chunk of the orchestra from Cateura was there, then there were also some excellent musicians from the InterSchool Orchestras of New York. It was one of the best feeling concerts I’ve ever attended. The audience was psyched and the place was packed. Trinity Church just sounds great, so it was a peak experience, let’s put it that way.

CH: What are your hopes for the success of Landfill Harmonic, and for the music you wrote for it?

MAL: I would love as many people as possible to see it. It’s in limited theatrical release now. It’s done the festival circuit and a certain number of people got to see that, but I believe once it’s on television, which will happen later in the winter, it’s going to reach a much broader audience. There are a number of different goals that I would have for it. One is that the orchestra becomes sustaining enough that it becomes a permanent institution for the town of Cateura. Right now, it’s still very much in its infancy, in the sense that it’s only 10 years old. I hope that interest in the orchestra, and in its story, continues and it becomes a classic, as opposed to a flash in the pan. It looks like that’s what’s going to be happening, so that’s great.

I also think that it can inspire efforts all around the world, including here in the United States. One of the organizations I’ve recently started working with is the Mr. Holland’s Opus Foundation. They raise money to pay for instruments for disadvantaged schools. This was something that was started by the late, great composer Michael Kamen. They’ve been around for about 20 years, and they’ve done a really fine job. There’s something like 10,000 instruments that they have managed to distribute. I don’t really know the exact number, but that’s something I’ve only recently gotten involved with. That kind of mission is one that I feel the Landfill story inspires.

CH: Give us a quick rundown of what you’re working on now.

MAL: Right now, I’m scoring a film that has a working title that is kind of secret, but it’s an independent film out of New York that I think is going to be really fascinating and a character study. I’m also scoring Lego DC Super Hero Girls: A Case of the Mondays, and I’m involved in a number of other songwriting/song producing projects. I’ve been working on an album with Evelyn Glennie, the wonderful Scottish percussionist. She’s one of the world’s most respected classical percussionists and we’re doing an album tentatively titled Marimbalin, in which her marimba playing and my violin playing are featured.

—FSMO