David Hirschfelder: from Ballarat to John Farnham to Russell Crowe

They're some of the elements that have shaped the career of one of Australia's best motion picture music composers - David Hirschfelder.

The Ballarat-educated musician has just wrapped up the score for 'Sleeping Dogs' - a story shot in Melbourne about a homicide detective with Alzheimer's (Crowe) solving a decades-old cold case.

But even if the film won't be released until March, chances are you've almost certainly heard Hirschfelder's tunes before.

He was the keyboardist behind the 'Slip Slop Slap' and 'Life. Be In It' jingles - while his experimental band Pyramid led to a role revamping the sound of the Little River Band - and again with John Farnham on the 'Whispering Jack' album.

Beyond that he has created the music for Shine, Strictly Ballroom and even the Michelle Payne biopic Ride Like a Girl.

"My heart is still in Ballarat," Hirschfelder said.

"I hadn't been there much since my parents moved away 10 years ago. They've since passed away.

"But I came back in January. We stayed at Hotel Vera, went to Underbar - and seriously, I really mean this: Ballarat has one of the best art galleries I have ever been to.

"It's got everything."

The now-Melbourne-based composer said he saw Ballarat in a completely different light, after spending more than 10 years of his childhood here, with teachers who encouraged his musical improvisation and invention.

"I guess you take it for granted," he said.

"But I feel it's time to come back to Ballarat and reconnect with it."

Hirschfelder was born in Richmond and moved "all around the place" until settling down in Ballarat, half-way through primary school.

He started at Wendouree Primary in Grade 2 and completed his HSC next door at Ballarat Grammar.

"I know when we arrived, we rented a small house at the Ballarat airport," he said.

"Dad was a pilot - and back in the 1960s those homes were a cute group of weatherboard houses.

"Those homes were a bustling little community of pilots and their families all waiting to find a house in Ballarat.

"The last time I went out there they were falling down - and they'd probably be gone now."

The Hirschfelders found a more permanent home in Victoria Avenue, Lake Wendouree.

"It was off Drummond Street North. I used to ride my bike to school - and when it rained I'd take an old vintage tram by the lake."

Hirschfelder said his Oma and Opa (German grandparents) had a piano that was only ever used when he was around to bang on the keys.

He was four years old.

"The piano became ours and it followed us around everywhere we moved.

"When I was six or seven Mum organised some extra-curricular lessons at the Sacred Heart Convent in (Victoria Street East Ballarat).

"When I started I could already play a few pop tunes I'd heard on the radio - then worked out on the piano - and was playing by ear.

"I wouldn't say I was a child prodigy, but I had an ear for music.

"Lucy was my teacher, but when she died I had Sister Theresa Lynch

"She was a great teacher and nurtured my confidence.

"Everything I did she encouraged, even if I wasn't following the music on the page.

'She'd say: That's fantastic that you made that up - now let's go back to the page!" he laughed.

"Sister Therese encouraged me to be creative."

In 1974 young David graced the pages of The Courier after blitzing a state electronic organ competition.

"I think I lucked out because I was exposed to a real diversity of music."

Hirschfelder said he felt a tad self-conscious at the time, heading into a girls school for music lessons - but the connection to Sacred Heart (now Damascus College) proved to be valuable.

"I met the Sargeants. They were a huge musical family in Ballarat, connected to the Catholic church.

"We formed a band - playing jazz and folk and some really interesting experimental stuff."

The teenage Hirschfelder also joined school choirs and yearned to play a "cool" saxophone.

Ballarat Grammar encouraged him to master the clarinet first.

"I became active in the school orchestra. Playing piano by yourself can be a lonely existence so it was good to be in an ensemble with other people and learn to work together.

"In my late teens I also started to include more influences like African-American music and pop."

At one point he was learning three instruments at once, with days he was forced to lug all three on the school bus.

"I like to improvise, but I actually enjoyed the theory side of music," he said.

"I found it fascinating to learn the conventions of writing music - but rules are made to be broken and you don't know how to break the rules unless you know what those rules are in the first place.

"What I learned in Ballarat has given me an order and structure to my approach that I am still using to this day."

After Ballarat Grammar, 1977 was an incredibly busy year for the inventive musician.

"I started First Year at the University of Melbourne but got busier and busier with gigs and jingles.

"In those days musicians were putting out multiple TV and radio jingles every week.

"The university had a composition unit as part of their course but there was nothing for film composition which is what I really wanted to do.

"In the end one of the lecturers joked that I was so busy with work I was probably earning more than he was!

"I deferred and never went back - but in my 30s I kinda wondered if I had done the right thing.

"By that time I was a father of two kids, touring with John Farnham and doing film and documentary composition anyway."

The self-taught composer and arranger also worked with The Seekers' Bruce Woodley on radio program IDs. Among them was the tune for Take 40 Australia - a syndicated weekly hit countdown that ran for 32 years.

"These days people have home studios, but back then you'd perform six jingles in a three-hour session - and you'd get paid, say $100 a jingle, which was a lot of money in the late '70s.

"I lived on a commercial music career and then played live gigs at night."

During this period he got to know the Little River Band - and their new vocalist John Farnham - who often shared the same studio space.

One thing led to another and Hirschfelder became their keyboardist and Fairlight synthesizer specialist, creating the band's new sound on Playing to Win (1984).

He wove the same magic on You're the Voice and across the Whispering Jack album.

"The Fairlight was actually an Australian invention - by a man called Peter Vogel.

"But the original version was a real monster, It was a huge delicate thing to carry around - a logistical nightmare.

"It cost $35,000 to lease a Fairlight in the early 1980s.

"But how good is my partner?! We sacrificed a house deposit for that Fairlight because she had a good feeling about it.

"And it helped to forge the sounds of Whispering Jack.

"With that device you could morph together different sounds and create hybrid electronics to forge a sound that was different again.

"With Playing to Win I combined a woodblock with the sound of a clavinet (electrically amplified clavichord) and made what they call a sawtooth sound wave."

Several of John Farnham's other band members now live in the Ballarat-Castlemaine area.

Hirschfelder's first TV score was Suzi's Story - a 1990 documentary about a woman battling AIDS.

It came about after he met the filmmaker "by accident".

The result was a Penguin - a now-defunct Australian television award - for an original score.

Not bad for a first-timer.

Next came projects including the Jason Donovan mini-series Shadows of the Heart, the film Strictly Ballroom - and again - more awards flowed.

Hollywood scores have included Sliding Doors, Elizabeth and Legend of the Guardians.

In 2019 Hirschfelder also wrote most of the music for Ride Like a Girl.

"It was a great cast and a great story. I really enjoyed working on that film.

"I got to meet Michelle (Payne) - and the story really resonated with me, coming from Ballarat."

The now-Melbourne-based composer said film scores were often one of the last steps in the moviemaking process - and he didn't always get to meet the stars of the screen.

"You'll discuss what is needed for different parts of the film and make a lot of notes.

'Even after you have finished the score, there can still be some editing."

"These days with a bunch of time code notes you can have a director in Los Angeles, a producer in Sydney and I can be in Melbourne.

"In the past you'd have to fly to LA - I honestly don't know how we did it."

Hirschfelder said he was honoured to be asked to perform at an anniversary concert for Ballarat Grammar in 2011 - and expressed a desire to get back more often.

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