A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film. The score comprises a number of orchestral, instrumental, or choral pieces called cues, which are timed to begin and end at specific points during the film in order to enhance the dramatic narrative and the emotional impact of the scene in question. Scores are written by one or more composers under the guidance of or in collaboration with the film's director or producer and are then most often performed by an ensemble of musicians – usually including an orchestra or band, instrumental soloists, and choir or vocalists – known as playback singers – and recorded by a sound engineer. The term is less frequently applied to music written for media such as live theatre, television and radio programs, and video games, and said music is typically referred to as either the soundtrack or incidental music.
Excalibur is a 1981 epic medieval fantasy film directed, cowritten and produced by John Boorman, that retells the legend of King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table, based loosely on the 15th-century Arthurian romance Le Morte d'Arthur by Thomas Malory. It stars Nigel Terry as Arthur, Nicol Williamson as Merlin, Nicholas Clay as Lancelot, Cherie Lunghi as Guenevere, Helen Mirren as Morgana, Liam Neeson as Gawain, Gabriel Byrne as Uther and Patrick Stewart as Leondegrance. The film is named after the legendary sword of King Arthur that features prominently in Arthurian literature. The film's soundtrack features the music of Richard Wagner and Carl Orff, along with an original score by Trevor Jones.
Michael Arnold Kamen was an American composer, orchestral arranger, orchestral conductor, songwriter, record producer and musician.
David Arnold is an English film composer whose credits include scoring five James Bond films (1997-2008), as well as Stargate (1994), Independence Day (1996), Godzilla (1998), Shaft (2000), 2 Fast 2 Furious (2003), Four Brothers (2005), Hot Fuzz (2007), and the television series Little Britain and Sherlock. For Independence Day, he received a Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Composition Written for a Motion Picture or for Television, and for Sherlock, he and co-composer Michael Price won a Creative Arts Emmy for the score of "His Last Vow", the final episode in the third series. Arnold scored the BBC / Amazon Prime series Good Omens (2019) adapted by Neil Gaiman from his book Good Omens, written with Terry Pratchett. Arnold is a fellow of the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors.
Mark Mancina is an American film composer. A veteran of Hans Zimmer's Media Ventures, Mancina has scored over sixty films and television series including Speed, Bad Boys, Twister, Tarzan, Training Day, Brother Bear, Criminal Minds, Blood+,Planes and Moana.
Randy Edelman is an American musician, producer, and composer for film and television. He began his career as a member of Broadway's pit orchestras; he later produced solo albums for songs that were picked up by leading music performers including The Carpenters, Barry Manilow, and Dionne Warwick. He is known for his work in comedy films. He has been awarded many prestigious awards along with two nominations for a Golden Globe Award, a BAFTA Award, and twelve BMI Awards. Edelman was given an honorary doctorate in fine arts by the University of Cincinnati in 2004.
Roy Frederick Budd was a British jazz pianist and composer known for his film scores, including Get Carter and The Wild Geese.
Howard David Blake is an English composer, conductor, and pianist whose career has spanned more than 50 years and produced more than 650 works. Blake's most successful work is his soundtrack for Channel 4’s 1982 film The Snowman, which includes the song "Walking in the Air". He is increasingly recognised for his classical works including concertos, oratorios, ballets, operas and many instrumental pieces.
Patrick Doyle is a Scottish composer and occasional actor best known for his film scores. During his 50-year career in film, television and theatre, he has composed the scores for over 60 feature films. A longtime collaborator of actor-director Kenneth Branagh, Doyle is known for his work on films such as Henry V, Sense and Sensibility, Hamlet, Carlito's Way, Quest for Camelot, and Gosford Park, as well as Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Thor, Brave, Cinderella,Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile.
Jeff Beal is an American composer of music for film, television, recordings, and the concert hall. Highly regarded as a jazz instrumentalist and versatile composer, Beal creates music that often incorporates a synthesis of improvisatory and composed elements.
The Last of the Mohicans is the soundtrack album of the 1992 film of the same name.
Murray Jonathan Gold is an English composer for stage, film, and television and a dramatist for both theatre and radio. He is best known as the musical director and composer of the music for Doctor Who from its revival in 2005 until 2017. In 2023, he was announced to be returning to the series. Gold's other television work includes Queer as Folk, Last Tango in Halifax and Gentleman Jack. He has been nominated for five BAFTAs.
Dan Jones is a British composer and sound designer working in film and theatre. He read music at the University of Oxford, studied contemporary music theatre at the Banff Centre for the Arts and studied electro-acoustic composition and programming at the Centro Ricerche Musicali in Rome. Having explored various means of generating music algorithmically, he is the author of one of the earliest pieces of software for generating fractal or self-similar music. He has won BAFTA and Ivor Novello Awards.
Labyrinth is a soundtrack album by David Bowie and composer Trevor Jones, released in 1986 for the film Labyrinth. It was the second of three soundtrack releases in which Bowie had a major role, following Christiane F. (1981) and preceding The Buddha of Suburbia (1993). The soundtrack album features Jones' score, which is split into six tracks for the soundtrack: "Into the Labyrinth", "Sarah", "Hallucination", "The Goblin Battle", "Thirteen O'Clock", and "Home at Last".
Inon Zur is an Israeli-American composer of soundtracks for film, television, and video games. He has composed soundtracks for over 80 video games, which include Dragon Age, EverQuest, Fallout, Prince of Persia, Star Trek, the Syberia series, and Starfield. He has received multiple nominations, including three BAFTAs, and has won several awards, including an Emmy. Various music awards for his soundtracks on Men of Valor (2004), Crysis (2008), Dragon Age: Origins (2009), The Elder Scrolls: Blades (2019), Syberia: The World Before (2023) and Starfield (2024).
Aaron Zigman is a classically-trained American composer, producer, arranger, songwriter, and musician who has scored music for films including The Notebook, The Company Men, Bridge to Terabithia, John Q., The Proposal, Flicka, For Colored Girls, Flash of Genius, Sex & the City, Alpha Dog, and Escape from Planet Earth. He has also written, arranged and produced over 50 hit albums, and co-written songs with legendary and contemporary artists including Quincy Jones, Christina Aguilera, Phil Collins, Was, John Legend, Dionne Warwick, Ray Charles, Natalie Cole, Aretha Franklin, Tina Turner, and Seal.
Mark McKenzie is an American film composer and orchestrator.
James Shearman is an English conductor, orchestrator, and composer. He is perhaps best known for his contributions to film scores including those for Gosford Park,Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Manchester by the Sea and numerous others. He has collaborated frequently with composer, Patrick Doyle. In addition to his conducting and orchestration, Shearman is also a songwriter, having co-written the title track from Charlotte Church's 2000 album, Dream a Dream. He regularly conducts orchestras, including the London Symphony Orchestra, Philharmonia Orchestra, Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Qatar Philharmonic Orchestra.
Edward Benson Powell was an American arranger, orchestrator and composer, who served as Alfred Newman's musical lieutenant at 20th Century Fox film studios for over three decades. His contributions to the scores of 400 films culminated in the canon of widescreen Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals of the late 1950s, for which his arrangements, such as the extended "Carousel Waltz", continue to be revived in concerts and proms, as well as live-to-classic pictures. Powell was occasionally credited as Ed or without the middle initial, but his friends invariably called him Eddie.
Christian Henson is a British composer, primarily working on television and film soundtracks. He has also soundtracked video games, and is the co-founder of Spitfire Audio with fellow composer Paul Thomson. Henson has been nominated for a BAFTA and an Ivor Novello Award for his music.
