James Horner

Born in Los Angeles in 1953, after working two years for B movies, James Horner enjoyed a meteoric rise as a film composer in the early 1980s, especially after his score for Roger Corman's BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS proved succesful. His breakthrough as a mainstream composer came in 1982, when his scores for STAR TREK II THE WRATH OF KHAN and 48 HRS propelled him into the top ranks of film composers. He reaffirmed this position with his scores for GORKY PARK, BRAINSTORM and KRULL and returned a year later to the outer space regions for STAR TREK III THE SEARCH FOR SPOCK.

In 1985 he began a successful director - composer relationship with Ron Howard, when he scored COCOON. Horner and Howard would work again later again for films such as WILLOW, APOLLO 13 and A BEAUTIFUL MIND. (He later also teamed up with Edward Zwick for very dramatically effective work on GLORY and LEGENDS OF THE FALL.) He also proved to be a very imaginative composer with his unusual works for THE NAME OF THE ROSE and for WHERE THE RIVER RUNS BLACK.

His score for the James Cameron sci-fi /action thriller ALIENS received an Academy Award Nomination but the experience was an awful one, as the production of the film had run into overtime troubles, severely curtailing the time Horner had for his work, resulting in many frantic discussions with the director. Horner vowed never to work with Cameron again. His surprise when Cameron asked him again for TITANIC was understandable. TITANIC turned out to be Horner's most succesful score so far. It got him an Oscar for his dramatic score, an Oscar for Best Song (My Heart Will Go On, performed by Celine Dion) and many other awards.

Horner continued to impress with his music for DEEP IMPACT and THE PERFECT STORM, while remaining versatile enough to differentiate his work to films like BICENTENNIAL MAN, IRIS and A BEAUTIFUL MIND. Last year, James Cameron again approached him for the monumental AVATAR, for which Horner did an imposing score, featuring an impressively choral part. In the meantime, he has already been contacted for new and upcoming films for this year. (For one, he is scoring the upcoming THE KARATE KID remake.) Horner continues to work for films and remains an interesting composer to follow.