MUSIC CAME FIRST FOR THIS RELIGIOUS EPIC

Oscar winner Daniel Blumberg pushes Shaker traditionals to the extreme in Mona Fastvold’s 'The Testament of Ann Lee'

- BY TIM GREIVING

WILLIAM REXER Searchlight Pictures AMANDA SEYFRIED stars as the founder of the Shakers in "The Testament of Ann Lee." Daniel Blumberg, who won an Oscar for "The Brutalist," is the composer.

If the Shakers have a lasting cultural legacy, it is their music — most famously “Simple Gifts,” the uplifting spiritual Aaron Copland immortalized in his ballet “Appalachian Spring.”

It stands to reason, then, that a film about Ann Lee, the founding “mother” of this 18th century celibate Christian sect, would be a musical. But this was no conventional woman and “The Testament of Ann Lee,” directed by Mona Fastvold and opening Thursday in L.A., is no ordinary musical.

“Ann Lee was very radical and extreme,” says composer Daniel Blumberg, “and Mona is as well.”

As conceived by Fastvold and Blumberg, the entire tapestry of this film is musicalized — from the emphatic breathing, chest thumping and floor stomping that make up the worshipers’ rituals, to the songs, inspired by Shaker traditionals and performed by star Amanda Seyfried and the cast. Even the sounds of wind, the creaking of ships and a passing cow play a part.

“This cow walks past during the song ‘I Love Mother,’” says Blumberg, 35, visiting L.A. from his native England and speaking from a hotel room over Zoom. Bald with severe features but a soft and guileless disposition, he’s fidgety about the whole Hollywood press dance — this is only his fourth feature film score. But Blumberg is eager to dissect his music-making process and brag about his collaborators. “We were tuning the cows to the song,” he says.