Music cue references follow traditional ‘Hollywood’ cue numbering. Movie reels used to be held in cans of celluloid film, each can containing 20 minutes of footage. Thus a 1 hour & 40 minute feature would comprise 5 x cans. Music cues would be allocated to each film can worked from. Music cue ‘1M4’ means the 4th piece of music for the 1st can of film. M=music.
- 1Mx are the music cues for the first 20 minutes of the film.
- 2Mx are the music cues for the second 20 minutes of the film (20 minutes to 40 minutes)
- 3Mx are the music cues for the third 20 minutes of the film (40 minutes to one hour) etc.
where x = the number of the piece of music in that can, in order.
If a music cue goes over a 20-minute mark, it’s put in the can for its start point.
