Oklahoma City native Chris Bourland works in multiple areas of film with one common element – sound. Bourland’s areas of interest include on-set sound mixing, post-production audio editing, ADR, sound design, music supervision, music composition and recording.
“Music is my first passion,” said Bourland. “Music has basically led to an interest in all of these other sound related jobs in film. I try to combine them into a workflow that assists filmmakers in anything and everything sound related.”
Bourland studied music at both the University of Central Oklahoma (UCO) in Edmond and Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. When his music project at the time, Jumpship Astronaut, decided to take a break in 2015, Chris returned to school, and has since completed a Music Business Degree at The Academy of Contemporary Music at the University of Central Oklahoma (ACM@UCO) and received several certificates through Berklee’s online program in production, songwriting and orchestration. Bourland’s real introduction to the film industry came when he enrolled in the Digital Cinema Program at Oklahoma City Community College (OCCC). He has now worked as sound mixer on several feature films, as well as television, corporate and advertising projects. In addition to his on-set work, Bourland is currently doing audio post work for various clients as well as composing music for a variety of different projects.
“The music side is incredibly interesting to me. Directors and producers need so many different things,” said Bourland. “Being able to handle all of the music needs from writing, recording, mixing, and even licensing music from other artists is important, especially to smaller budget films. And, those are the films I really enjoy working on, so it’s worth it.”
Some of Bourland’s favorite projects this past year are mostly those in which he has acted as both sound editor and composer, including the musically influenced short films “Something Special” and “Encender” as well as “The Resistance”, a sci-fi short produced by the 2017 Nathan Gardocki Productions (NGP) workshop. Additional favorites include the documentary “Children of Hope” and composing the score for “Art Never Sleeps”, a behind-the-scenes documentary about Distant Vision, the live cinema project created by Francis Ford Coppola at OCCC. Bourland has also worked on several feature films that have used the Oklahoma Film Enhancement Rebate Program, including the forthcoming “Whaling”, “A Deadly Romance” and “Stuck Out of Love”.
When not working on projects, Bourland is studying orchestration, performing with longtime friends and Norman mainstay Klipspringer and developing a website for his sound and music services that will launch soon at BourlandProductions.com
“I’ve really enjoyed working in the Oklahoma film industry so far. It’s allowed me to go places I wouldn’t have been able to otherwise in my own state, and meet some really great people. Living in Oklahoma, we know we’re underdogs in this industry, so we have to work extra hard. Great things come out of situations like that.”
For more information, please visit Chris Bourland’s listing in the Oklahoma Production Directory.