Composer Alex Cote, MHS’10, thanks MHS teachers for ‘infusing a love of stories and music’ 

By Scott Calzolaio

A parent can only hope that when their child picks up a violin and painfully squeaks out “hot-crossed buns” for the first time, that someday it will end with an Emmy in hand. 

For one Milford native, that’s exactly what happened. 

Alexandre Cote, 32, MHS Class of 2010, and his team received this year’s Emmy for “Outstanding Music Direction and Composition for a Live Action Program” for their work in the Disney+ series “Percy Jackson and the Olympians.”

“I remember reading the books as a kid, and I totally fell in love with them,” Cote told the Milford Free Press from his home in Los Angeles. “Working on the series was such a pleasant surprise, to return to a bit of childhood.”

Cote personally thanks Milford Director of Music Nadine Pomeroy, MHS band instructor Jillian Langford-Boday, as well as retired English teacher Jim McCallum, for “infusing a love of stories and music.”

“The music program there was such a big part of my belief that this was doable,” Cote said. “I feel like I lucked into a musical town, and that helped build me up to where I am now.”

Call it luck, talent, serendipity, or fate - Alex calls it what it is to him, ‘a dream job.’

“Somewhere in the middle of high school, it clicked for me that this is what I wanted to do,” he said. In his living room, lost deep in Middle Earth, Howard Shore’s undeniably epic soundtrack to the “Lord of the Rings” sunk its musical teeth into a young Cote, and there was no looking back, he said.

Alex Cote (far right) poses with his colleagues at Emmy Awards ceremony in March. Photo source: LinkedIn

“So yes, this is the dream. And I’ll say that the dream is going alright so far,” he laughed. “Part of the reason anyone chases the so-called ‘Dream of Hollywood’ is because something in childhood resonated with you. Having the opportunity to revisit that as an adult, and create the things that brought you so much joy as a kid, there’s just so much magic and power to that.”

From high school, Cote auditioned at Berkeley School of Music for violin, was accepted, and received his undergrad before taking an internship in Los Angeles.

Over the past 10 years, Cote has built his way up from working as an assistant to being responsible for writing scores to entire projects. 

The music for the TV adaptation of “Percy Jackson” was led by composer Bear McCreary and his L.A.-based company, Sparks and Shadows. Cote was a member of the Sparks and Shadows team as a composer for this project. 

Here’s how it breaks down. McCreary acts as “lead composer” working directly with the showrunners to come up with themes and musical motifs for each character.

“As we get into the nitty-gritty of composing each episode, we divide and conquer the labor of writing the actual underscore,” he explained.

When Cote is assigned a scene to score, he goes through the creative process of drawing inspiration, soaking in McCreary’s vision, and synthesizing a soundtrack digitally in his studio.

“My job is to apply everything that we’ve built up for the show, for that specific scene,” Cote said.

Once the score is approved by McCreary and the showrunners, the parts are then translated to sheet music and handed over to a live orchestra to record.

For his compositions in Percy Jackson, Cote said he tried to channel a bit of John Williams’ score from “Harry Potter.”

There are a lot of parallels between “Percy Jackson” and “Harry Potter,” he said. “I wanted to try and capture some of the magic you feel listening to ‘Harry Potter’ but change the ‘colors’ to more of what we were working with for ‘Percy Jackson’.”

Though his part in the composition of the score was imperative, he humbly acknowledges that this is not a one-man show.

“There are a ton of moving parts, there are so many people involved in making these scores a success, and this one worked perfectly,” Cote said. “No one person made this thing happen, and we all deserve this recognition as a team.”

Milford native and Emmy winner Alex Cote, MHS’10, personally thanks Milford Director of Music Nadine Pomeroy, MHS band instructor Jillian Langford-Boday, as well as retired English teacher Jim McCallum, for “infusing a love of stories and music.”

“The music program there was such a big part of my belief that this was doable,” Cote said. “I feel like I lucked into a musical town, and that helped build me up to where I am now.”