James Horner

Los Angeles born and partly London schooled — the Royal College of Music, before USC and UCLA — James Horner intended a life in concert music and found one in the cinema instead, by way of Roger Corman's low-budget productions. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan in 1982, then Krull and Aliens, established a manner that stayed with him: orchestral scoring with chorus and electronics. Celtic instruments and vocal colours became a signature, from Braveheart onwards, though the range ran from Field of Dreams to Apollo 13. His work with James Cameron produced Titanic, whose score and whose song My Heart Will Go On, written with Will Jennings, brought him two Academy Awards in a single evening, and later Avatar. More than a hundred films carry his music. He died in 2015. An early film score, for The Lady in Red, came in 1979, and later credits took in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, The Mask of Zorro, Deep Impact, A Beautiful Mind and The Amazing Spider-Man. Six Grammy Awards and two Golden Globes stand beside the Oscars. A pilot himself, he was sixty-one when the Short Tucano he was flying came down. His concert works include Pas de Deux, for violin, cello and orchestra, and Collage, for four horns and orchestra.