The 50 Best Film-Score Composers
And Their Greatest Soundtracks
Plenty of times, I read or heard the statement: ‘Film-score composers are the compositional geniuses of our time.’ In my eyes, there is a lot of truth behind this statement. Film-score composers need to be literate not only in many different musical genres but they also have to have a particularly keen sense for the interaction between video and music.
As a normal composer you are free to compose whatever you want most of the times. As a film-score composer you have to deal with many restrictions like deadlines, the directors vision, temp tracks, video, scenes and many more.
Besides all these tripping stones there have been some marvelous film-score composers that created the most compelling soundtrack for great films. These soundtracks not only function as a third emotional dimension in film but are on their own of high aesthetic value as well.
To honor these composers and to create an overview of their greatest soundtracks, I made this list of 50 of the best film-score composers. In order to separate the wheat from the chaff, I asked the help my college and friend Colin van der Lei who is an ambitious film-score composer himself. Thanks Colin!
At a last step, I added the soundtrack’s product links on amazon. Beside my own benefit ( 😉 ), it also gives you the possibility to see the track-list and in some cases preview the songs of the album. To make this a little more interactive, I would like to invite you to share your most favorite soundtrack via a YouTube link with us. At the end of this list you find Colin’s and my all-time favorite soundtracks.
| Composer | Born In | Time | Soundtracks |
| Max Steiner | Austria, Vienna | 1888 – 1971 | Casablanca | King Kong | Now, Voyager | Gone With the Wind |
| Sergei Prokofiev | Russland | 1891 – 1953 | Lt. Kije | Alexander Nevsky | Ivan the Terrible |
| Erich Wolfgang Korngold | Austria, Brünn | 1897 – 1957 | The Adventures of Robin Hood | The Sea Hawk |
| Aaron Copland | USA, Brooklyn | 1900 – 1990 | Of Mice and Men | The Red Pony | Our Town | The Heiress |
| Alfred Newman | USA, LA | 1901 – 1970 | Airport | How The West Was Won |
| Dmitri Shostakovich | Russia, Saint Petersburg | 1906 – 1975 | The Maxim Trilogy | Hamlet | King Lear |
| Franz Waxman | Germany | 1906 – 1967 | Rebecca | Sunset Boulevard |
| Bernard Herrmann | USA, NY | 1911 – 1975 | Psycho | Citizen Kane | Vertigo | Taxi Driver | Fahrenheit 451 |
| Nino Rot1 | Italy, Milan | 1911 – 1979 | The Godfather I, II, III | Romeo Juliet |
| Leonard Bernstein | USA, Massachusetts | 1918 – 1990 | West Side Story | On the Waterfront |
| Malcolm Arnold | GB, Northampton | 1921 – 2006 | The Lion | The Bridge on the River Kwai |
| Elmer Bernstein | USA, NY | 1922 – 2004 | The Magnificant Seven | To Kill a Mockingbird | The Greatest Game |
| Henry Mancini | USA, Ohio | 1924 – 1994 | Pink Panther | Breakfast at Tiffany’s | Love Story |
| Leonard Rosenman | USA, Brooklyn | 1924 – 2008 | Lord of the Rings | East of Eden |
| Maurice Jarre | France, Lyon | 1924 – 2007 | Doctor Zhivago | Lawrence of Arabia |
| Ennio Morricone | Italy, Rome | 1928 – now | The Mission | Once Upon a Time in the West | The Good The Bad and the Ugly | The Untouchables |
| Jerry Goldsmith | USA, LA | 1929 – 2004 | Star Trek | Poltergeist | Gremlins | The Mummy |
| Michel Legrand | France, Paris | 1932 – now | Cléo from 5 to 7 | The Windmills of Your Mind | The Thomas Crown Affair |
| John Williams | America, NYC | 1932 – now | Star Wars IV, V, VI, I, II, III | Jurassic Park I, II | Indiana Jones I, II, III, IV | Jaws I, II | E.T. | Harry Potter I, II, III | Superman I, II | Shindler’s List | Home Alone I, II |
| John Barry | GB – York | 1933 – 2011 | Dances with Wolves | Out of Africa | James Bond I-XII |
| Philip Glass | USA, Baltimore | 1937 – now | The Truman Show | The Fog of War |
| Randy Newman | USA, LA | 1943 – now | Toy Story I, II, III | Monster, Inc | Cars |
| Alan Menken | USA, LA | 1949 – now | The Little Mermaid | Beauty and the Beast | Aladdin | Pocahontas | The Hunchback of Notre Dame |
| Gabriel Yared | Lebanesia | 1949 – now | The English Patient | Bon Voyage | Amelia |
| Alan Silvestri | USA, NY | 1950 – now | Back to the Future I, II, III | Forest Gump | Mouse Hunt | Richie Rich |
| James Newton Howard | USA, LA | 1951 – now | Batman Begins |The Dark Knight | Blood Diamond | The Fugitive | Signs |
| Vangelis | Greece, Agria | 1943 – now | Conquest of Paradise | Chariots of Fire |
| David Newman | USA, LA | 1945 – now | Anastasia | Ice Age I |
| Howard Shore | Canada, Toronto | 1946 – now | Lord of the Rings I, II, III | The Silence of the Lambs | The Departed |
| Patrick Doyle | Scottland | 1953 – now | Sense and Sensibility | Quest for Camelot | Hamlet |
| Danny Elfman | USA, LA | 1953 – now | Edward Scissorhands | Batman | Mission: Impossible I | Beetlejuice | Alice in Wonderland |
| James Horner | USA, LA | 1953 – now | Titanic | Avatar | Apollo 13 | The Mask of Zorro | The Land Before Time |
| Trevor Rabin | South Africa | 1954 – now | National Treasure | Gone in 60 Seconds | Armageddon |
| Thomas Newman | USA, LA | 1955 – now | Amercian Beauty | The Green Mile | The Shawshank Redemption | The Horse Whisperer | Finding Nemo |
| John Debney | USA, California | 1956 – now | The Passion of the Christ | Bruce Almighty | Cutthroat Island |
| Don Davis | USA, California | 1957 – now | Matrix I, II, III | Jurassic Park III |
| Hans Zimmer | Germany, Frankfurt A.M. | 1957 – now | Pirates of the Caribbean I, II, III, IV | Batman Begins | The Dark Knight | The Dark Knight Rises | Gladiator | Pear Harbor | Lion King |
| Christopher Young | USA, New Jersey | 1958 – now | Spiderman III | The Grudge I, II | Urban Legend | Drag Me to Hell |
| Rachel Portman | GB, Haslemere | 1960 – now | The Legend of Bagger Vance | Chocolat |
| Alexandre Despla | France, Paris | 1961 – now | Harry Potter VII | The Golden Compass |
| Harry Gregson-Williams | GB, Chichester | 1961 – now | Narnia | Prince of Persia | Shrek I, II, III |
| David Arnold | GB, Bedfordshire | 1962 – now | Independence Day | Stargate | Godzilla | The World is not Enough |
| John Powell | GB, London | 1963 – now | Shrek | Bourne Identity I II, | III | Kong Fu Panda |
| Edward Shearmur | GB, London | 1966 – now | Sky Captain | The Count of Monte Cristo | Johnny English |
| Rupert Greson-Williams | GB | 1966 – now | Bed Time Stories | Click | Grown Ups |
| Klaus Badelt | Germany, Frankfurt | 1967 – now | Pirates of the Caribbean I | Equilibrium |
| Yann Tiersen | France, Brest | 1970 – now | Good Bye, Lenin! | Amélie |
| Ramin Djawadi | Germany, Duisburg | 1974 – now | Iron Man | Clash of the Titans |
| Henry Jackman | GB, Hilingdon | 1974 – now | X-Men: First Class | Kick-Ass |
| Brian Tyler | USA, LA | 1978 – now | Fast Furious | The Final Destination |
Colin’s all-time favorites
- John Williams – Patriot
- John Williams – Fawkes the Phoenix
- Alfred Newman – Airport
- John Williams – Harry’s Wondrous World
- John Williams -Hook
- John Williams – March from Midway
- John Debney – Cutthroat Island
- David Arnold – The World is not Enough
- Michael Giacchino – Ratatoulle
- John Williams – War Horse
My all-time favorites
- John Williams – Across the Stars
- Ennio Morricone – The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
- John Williams – Schindler’s List
- Alan Menken – Gaston
- Bernard Herrmann – Vertigo
Enjoy! If you think that one of your favorite film-score composers is missing please share in the comments below.
Book Recommendations for Film Score Composers
- Jeremy Borum
- Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
- Paperback: 272 pages
- Used Book in Good Condition
- Richard Bellis
- Publisher: Richard R. Bellis
- Paperback: 180 pages
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No Joe Hisaishi? Seriously?
As usual of the lists I read, no Joe Hisaishi. You guys should listen to his compositions. Then you will understand why he is one of the best, if not the best, film score composer of all time.
Er, Carter Burwell?
Georges Delerue? One of my favorites.
Got that right, important to the new Wave, sought wildly by Hollywood.
Danny Elfman didnt compose mission impossible. Lalo Schifrin did! which comes to the next question…why isn’t he on this list (dirty harry, bullet)
No Franz Waxman? Watch any old black and white classic and you will Franz Waxman followed by Max Steiner in the sheer numbers of amazing scores.
MY BAD! I reread the list and saw Franz Waxman at number 8. My apologies!
I just watched and then listened to Interstellar. The soundtrack is mesmerizing and enhances the movie tremendously. Incredible use of the organ. Thanks Hans Zimmer.
Nice reference list! I like the chronological ordering of the composers.
As a long-time fan of cinema and music, to my way of thinking, the most notable omissions include Georges Auric (1899-1983, maybe the greatest of all French film composers, esp. famous for “Beauty and the Beast”), William Walton (1902-1983, the great British composer who wrote fantastic scores for Olivier’s Shakespeare films and more), and Alex North (1910-1991, one of the top American film composers, who wrote the first notable jazz-influenced score, for “A Streetcar Named Desire,” as well as the scores for “Spartacus,” etc.).
Oh, and then there are the top two Japanese film composers, Fumio Hayasaka (1914-1955, famous for “Rashomon,” “Seven Samurai” and many more) and the great Toru Takemitsu (1930-1996, who composed a huge number of scores, including for “Ran” and “Black Rain”).
I could add Virgil Thomson (1896-1989, who composed important scores for the documentaries “The River,” “The Plow That Broke the Plains,” and “Louisiana Story”) as well as Brian Easdale (1909-1995, British film composer best known for “The Red Shoes”), the prolific David Raskin (1912-2004, best known for his famous score for “Laura”), and Kenyon Hopkins (1912-1983, perhaps most notably for his jazzy score for “The Hustler”). Another important and foundational figure is Dimitri Tiomkin (1894-1979, notable for “High Noon” and many other Westerns, etc.).
Anyway, I think some of those classic older guys deserve a spot ahead of some of the more recent and less time-tested ones. But I’m really glad to see so many of the true greats here, and your first 21 seem to me especially solid.
It’s funny that there are four guys named “Newman” on your list! Cheers.
Hey Allan,
Thank you for your input! I’ll check out the composer you mentioned that I don’t know.
I’m surprised Miklos Rozsa didn’t make your list.
A name that chould have been on the list is Jocelyn Pook. Masked Ball from Eyes Wide Shut and Adam´s Lullaby from A Rome in Rome is of the best from this Composer.
No Miklos Rosza no Georges Delerue – do your home work before going on this exercise in ignorance.
Marvin Hamlisch?
Illayaraaja – India
A R Rahman – India
Philip Glass – The Illusionist