Mirroring the powerful bond between the heroic characters of Team Avatar, friendship is the true source of strength behind the majestic sound of ATLA. Konietzko first visited the Wynn family home during his years as a student enrolled in the Rhode Island School of Design. There, he was introduced to a young Ben, the brother of Konietzko’s college friend.
“One Christmas break they came home and Bryan met me as a little punk,” recounts Wynn. “Fast forward a number of years, I end up going to California Institute of the Arts and don’t know anybody there. My brother’s like, ‘Oh, you should reach out to Bryan.’ Fast forward a bit more, we end up being roommates while I’m at CalArts and he’s working at Nickelodeon.”
Also in attendance at CalArts was Zuckerman, pursuing a master’s in Composition/New Media. The two CalArts students shared an interest in pushing the sonic envelope, often finding themselves at the university’s avant-garde performances alongside Konietzko.
“My focus was computer music and the processing of sound,” explains Zuckerman. “I met Bryan through Ben because Bryan would come to these performances. In some crazy way, he saw that it would work for Avatar. I have no idea how I made that leap in his mind. But he was like, ‘I like the way you think about sound and music. I don’t want a seasoned media composer. I want someone who’s gonna think of it differently.’”
Zuckerman worried that taking on the ATLA assignment would mean “betraying my own philosophy,” as he confesses. But he had a partner in crime in Wynn, and the experimental artists had recently formed their own ambitious soundtrack and sound design production service, calling themselves the Track Team.
“One day, Bryan comes home and says Nickelodeon wants him and Mike [Dante DiMartino] to pitch a show. And so they start thinking of the concept and drawing characters on our kitchen table,” remembers Wynn. “And then another day he comes home and says, ‘They want to make it. Do you and Jeremy want to do the music and sound?’ I remember just being like, ‘Sure.’ He was like, ‘No, seriously, it’s going to be a lot of work. Are you sure you want to do this?’ And I was like, ‘Sure.’”
