USC Athletics Producer Jasmine Blevins’ Storytelling Journey is Paved with Sights and APM Sounds

The University of Southern California’s women's basketball is a well-respected and competitive program within the NCAA. The team has a rich history of success and has produced many talented players who have had successful careers on and off the court, including Cheryl Miller, who led USC to two national championships and is considered one of the greatest players in history. 

Aside from its basketball program, USC is also known for its compelling sports video content that highlights its teams and players throughout the season. They produce high-quality content ranging from player season highlights to livestreams. 

Jasmine Blevins is a digital media producer for USC athletics and one of the best storytellers in the college athletics circuit. The secret to her success is striking a great balance between sights and sounds. 

“When I was in film school at USC, I had a professor who told me: ‘your sight is the front door, and music and sound is the back door,’” Jasmine said. “You can set a mood, you can set a feeling, the tone, and you pace a piece with the music and the sounds that you have behind it. You can change an entire piece from being a comedy to being horror to be just a slice of life piece by what music you put behind it.” 

Jasmine is a gifted storyteller whose passion for capturing the right scenes can only be matched by her passion for finding the right music for her projects. And when it comes to sounds and music, APM Music is her preferred platform. 

Jasmine discovered APM Music when she worked for the Los Angeles Chargers. There she experienced the full power of APM’s search engine and its vast library of music. Last year, she wanted to bring the APM Music experience to USC, so she asked for it, and she got it. 

“When I’m searching for different kinds of music–kind of like, do I want a D-minor? Or do I want a D-Major? Am I looking for a crescendo of some sort–anticipation?” Jasmine said. “Those types of keywords that you can put into APM and find the music that you’re looking for, and I really liked it.” 

APM was the first music library that she truly dug into and really got to know and use on a regular basis. 

As women’s basketball grew in USC, and with Jasmine’s flair for the dramatic, she leaned on APM to supply the music that she needs to tell her stories. She loves using tracks that are hard-hitting with a lot of bass, especially to show how gritty this team has become. She was producing a highlight for Rayah Marshall, an incredible USC defender, and looking for a song–or sound–that encapsulated Rayah’s game. 

“I typed in a few of those keywords–’anticipation,’ ‘bass,’ ‘drum,’ ‘building,’ ‘trailer,’ ‘movie trailer-type soundtrack,’ and I found it. It’s something different when you can find a song that moves the piece,” Jasmine said, “I don’t remember what the song is called exactly, but when I found it, I remember sitting at my desk and just raising my hands saying, ‘we got it!’” 

One of the APM Music resources that Jasmine uses is the music director service. She had a few pieces that that needed something like "New Orleans bounce," but she wasn’t sure how to type that into the APM search engine–and she needed it very quickly. So, she emailed the music directors and they had it for her in the timeline she needed it. The music directors not only sent one track but multiple tracks.  

“It was awesome because I felt I was connecting with the music directors,” she said. “I was telling them the sound that I really wanted, and they understood that. They helped me create the piece with me.” 

While Jasmine can find all the music and sounds, she needs to create her compelling content, the benefits of using APM are not limited to the platform’s ultramodern search engine, vast number of tracks, and music director service. For her, one of the best parts of using APM is simply learning more about music. 

“One of the best parts about my journey with APM is just learning about music even more than I knew it before,” Jasmine said. “And being able to work with people who know music even deeper than I do. Folks who compose and learn how I could use strings in ways I’ve never used before, the piano to emote different emotions in the audience because at the end of the day what we’re trying to do is tell stories and sound is a huge part of that.” 

The USC Women’s Basketball Team At-a-Glance 

• The USC women's basketball team has been competing since 1976, when the program was first established. 
• The team has made 17 appearances in the NCAA tournament, with the most recent appearance coming in 2014. 
• USC has won two conference championships, in 1983 and 2014. 
• Lindsay Gotlieb is the current head coach of the USC women's basketball team. 
• The team plays its home games at the Galen Center, which has a capacity of 10,258. 
• The USC women's basketball team has produced several successful players who have played professionally or pursued careers in coaching. Examples include Tina Thompson, Lisa Leslie, and Cynthia Cooper-Dyke.