The Sound of '1899'

The new hit mystery series – since November 17, exclusively on Netflix 

Berlin, November 28, 2022 – “Creating music exists in a dream space. It’s not tied to reality. It’s more freeing and the possibilities become endless,” says composer Ben Frost, who did impressive work on the score of the Netflix mystery hit 1899. For this successful series, based on an immigrant ship bound for New York from Europe, Ben Frost took an unusual musical path. He created drama by taking compositions he’d recorded in studios around the world, with various vocalists, ensembles, and orchestras, and replaying them through a loudspeaker in ships in Iceland. “I took those recordings and fed them through a speaker into various parts of the ship using the music to resonate. […] It becomes something else [through this process], it becomes very alive.”

After the series got off to a flying start, Netflix released a spectacular, and melodious, featurette about Ben Frost and how the unique score for 1899 was created.

Watch the Making the Score featurette HERE.

Find the official score for the series HERE.

 The intro song to the hit series is a cover of a classic – “White Rabbit” by Jefferson Airplane (1967), reinterpreted in an extraordinary way by Eliot Sumner. 

Dive into the musical world of 1899 and listen to the complete Spotify playlist for the series HERE.

About Ben Frost

Composer Ben Frost already worked on the music for the Netflix Original series DARK by Baran bo Odar and Jantje Friese. He was born in Australia but has been working from Iceland since 2005, under the name Bedroom Community, with his friends Valgeir Siguråsson and Nico Muhly. His albums released so far include Steel Wound (2003), Theory of Machines (2007), By the Throat (2009) and Aurora (2014). As a film composer he has created music for productions such as Sleeping Beauty (2011), The Deep (2012), Frost (2012) and Super Dark Times (2017). 

1899 has been available worldwide and exclusively on Netflix since November 17.

Further press materials are available in our Media Center.

Find the series on Netflix HERE. 

About 1899

The eight episodes follow mysterious events during the voyage of an immigrant ship from Europe to New York. The passengers, all of different backgrounds, are united by their hopes for a new century and their future abroad. When they discover a second ship adrift on the open sea that had gone missing for months, their journey takes an unexpected turn. What they find on board will turn their passage to the promised land into a nightmare-like riddle, connecting each of the passenger’s pasts through a web of secrets.

About DARK WAYS GmbH

After their global success with DARK (Netflix), the showrunner duo Jantje Friese and Baran bo Odar founded the production company DARK WAYS. With their company, they hope to produce high quality stories and distribute them worldwide. The series 1899 marks the first production by DARK WAYS.

About DARK BAY GmbH

DARK BAY is Europe’s first LED studio for virtual productions, founded by DARK WAYS and Studio Babelsberg in the historic halls of Potsdam Babelsberg. The virtual production studio is one of the biggest LED installations in the world and uses cutting-edge ROE Ruby LED panels. ARRI, FABER A.V., and FRAMESTORE were attracted as industry partners. DARK BAY’s first customer is the production 1899, offering future clients a well proven setup.

About Netflix

Netflix is the world's leading streaming entertainment service with 223 million paid memberships in over 190 countries enjoying TV series, documentaries and feature films, reality and comedy formats, and even mobile games across a wide variety of genres and languages. Members can watch as much as they want, anytime, anywhere, on any internet-connected screen. Members can play, pause and resume watching, all without commercials or commitments.