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Film music has been one of my strongest passions for most of my life, and I’ve been enormously invested in it for nearly 25 years now. Alan Silvestri, Jerry Goldsmith, and James Horner were the three composers who introduced me to film music when I was around 10 years old in the late 80’s, and it was through an unusual conduit – Arnold Schwarzenegger.
As a 10-year-old kid I was a huge Schwarzenegger fan, and films like Predator, Commando, Red Heat, Total Recall, and the Terminator films between the years 1985-1991 knocked my socks off. Not only that, but for some reason, the music really stood out to me and was a unique and substantial component to my enjoyment of these movies. I made an effort to note the names behind the notes: Silvestri, Goldsmith, Horner, Fiedel. For Christmas in 1990 my sister gave me what I think was my first film score ever, Goldsmith’s Total Recall, which I often credit as my grand and amazing introduction to film music.
I collected other scores around that time too, but those ass-kicking, propulsive scores to Predator, Commando, and Red Heat eluded me as they were unavailable (maybe you could find Red Heat if you had lots of luck), and their elusive quality only made them more attractive. Silvestri was already a favorite as I was able to garner his audiocassette scores to Back to the Future II and III but I had to have Predator and I had to have Horner’s Commando and Red Heat. Now, you folks who discovered Horner via scores like Star Trek II, Krull, Battle Beyond the Stars, or Brainstorm might be laughing at me!
Anyway, I picked up what Horner I could in the meantime. I found Another 48 Hrs. and I adored it because it came as close to the Commando/Red Heat sound as I could possibly come. I played the hell out of those 4 score cues on that cassette! Then I became a fan of the movie Aliens when I caught it on broadcast TV and picked up the Varese cassette and was blown away by its scary, relentless, atmospheric terror. Soon after that I picked up Patriot Games on tape, and it did stray from the Commando/Red Heat sound but had a few of their trademarks, like the rhythmic flutes and echoing synth voices, but it also introduced me to a bit of Horner’s more “international” flavor. I played the hell out of that tape.
Around this time CDs became the norm, and I began to build my film score collection. Lots of composers, but focusing on Horner, my assortment grew. I believe somehow I picked up Glory first, because I was so impressed with it in the film – “Charging Fort Wagner” blew me away, as did the end credits material and “A Call to Arms”. I remember being so impressed as I was beginning to understand the expanse of Horner’s capabilities. I picked up Thunderheart and Unlawful Entry because they were inexpensive! They didn’t do that much for me, although I’ve since come to appreciate Thunderheart quite a bit.
The next year, 1994, saw another leap in my appreciation of Horner’s music, as I picked up CDs for The Pelican Brief, Clear and Present Danger, and Legends of the Fall. My Horner collection was growing nicely, but so was my variation in genre representing the man’s talents. I was quickly becoming such a big fan and being introduced to different styles through his scores, learning to appreciate different techniques and having my horizons expanded via his chameleon-like maneuverability. I was beginning to appreciate the power and expanse of orchestral scores through Horner beginning with Clear and Present Danger and particularly Legends of the Fall. However, the following year was the real eye/ear-opener, as Braveheart changed everything.
Horner completely won my heart and soul with this Braveheart and I knew I was a fan for life. It just captured me and captivated me and made me feel things in listening to music and experiencing music that I had never felt and experienced before; listening to Braveheart became a transcendent experience and summed up everything magical there was about my love of film music. The sweeping themes, the huge orchestral performances, the ethnic instrumentation, my favorite woodwind performances and female synth, the pounding drums…it did it all. Horner momentum built.
I would browse the CD aisles at Barnes & Noble, Best Buy, or wherever and often return home with new Horner scores. Apollo 13…Sneakers…Willow…Field of Dreams…Casper…Jumanji…Ransom…Gorky Park. And I still checked the “C” and “R” section for Commando and Red Heat every single time hoping to find those scores, just thinking maybe I would get lucky. Meanwhile, I had plenty of other scores and I was growing less and less concerned with those two and becoming enamored with so many more Horner gems.
1997 was a big year for my Horner odyssey. The internet was becoming a ‘thing’ and I discovered online The James Horner Shrine (I may be recalling the name incorrectly) created by Tom Hudson, which was a wonderful community for those who enjoyed Horner’s music to gather and discuss their thoughts and feelings and the scores. This was a great opportunity for me, the first opportunity to finally communicate with other people (gasp) who actually really dug this kind of music, who were really touched by it, who owned it (gasp) and being a part of the community of Horner fans at the Shrine was a wonderful experience and a fun time in the early days of the internet. It was right during this time too that Titanic was released, and while my appreciation and love of Horner’s music had grown ten sizes too big the past few years due to Braveheart and Legends of the Fall, Titanic made room for even more wow factor. No, I did not like the Celine Dion song, but the entire score was yet another triumph to my ears, and a huge one at that.
From this point on, I made a point to buy pretty much every Horner score that was released whether I saw the film or not. More often than not, though, I would see a film simply because it had a Horner score anyway. I became ravenous for Horner scores after Titanic, and the period after that score I was probably the most eager for his music than I’ve ever been and attacked Deep Impact, The Mask of Zorro and Mighty Joe Young with a vengeance. He didn’t seem to let up with that trio of scores in his creativity and energy either, he didn’t slouch after Titanic but continued to hold the bar high for himself and I really respected that and continued on in my appreciation of his music and steadfast heartfelt connection to the depth at which his music spoke to me.
Bicentennial Man the next year didn’t do much for me aside from the Main Title and a few other cues, but The Perfect Storm was excellent despite what I felt was overuse of the main theme, which I felt was something Horner often did and sometimes I was cool with it and sometimes I accepted it. How the Grinch Stole Christmas was effective but not really my kind of score; Enemy at the Gates was wonderful and even though it meandered a bit on album it had plenty of incredible tracks, not least of which was the show-stopping, epic opening blowout.
As the turn of the century settled, I continued a passionate exploration of Goldsmith’s career in music and looked into even more composers. Furthermore, I discovered and began to investigate the works of who would turn out to be my current favorite composer, Marco Beltrami. As these events transpired, Horner remained one of my top favorites, but his scores were not as consistently revered by me. I began to be more selective in which Horner scores I really enjoyed, or more came along that I didn’t connect with as much. Windtalkers, Bobby Jones, All the Kings Men, The Spiderwick Chronicles, The Chumscrubber, The Forgotten, A Beautiful Mind – these were all very respectable scores with fine moments to be had, I just didn’t fall under their spell as I did with so many other Horner scores. There were still definite scores of true accomplishment and amazement as the years went by, though, don’t get me wrong. New scores of the new millennium to come along such as The Four Feathers, Beyond Borders, House of Sand and Fog, Troy, Flightplan, Apocalypto, The Life Before Her Eyes, Avatar, The Amazing Spider-Man, The Karate Kid and especially The Missing and The New World could still blow me away and exhibit the same level (with varying degrees) of magic that Horner delivered for me in the 90’s.
In the past 10 years I also circled back and picked up older Horner scores that I never picked up on when they were first released: Star Trek II & III, Jade, The Spitfire Grill, The Pagemaster, Balto, House of Cards, A Far Off Place, The Rocketeer, The Journey of Natty Gann, etc. The Journey of Natty Gann and House of Cards in particular took me by surprise as they came out of nowhere to become two of my very favorite Horner scores that I utterly fell in love with that I previously knew nothing about. So thankful for specialty soundtrack labels for rescuing these scores and issuing them so that folks like myself can discover them and treasure them.
And yes, I finally got Commando and it was glorious! It very much lived up to its hype for me, I just really dig that sound and it’s such a fun listen. Red Heat is actually a CD I acquired through a gentleman I met on the James Horner Shrine in the late 90’s, a fella you all know around here by the name of Jon Broxton. I traded my CD of Zimmer’s Beyond Rangoon for his copy of Red Heat and I was thrilled to finally have this CD! It wasn’t as tremendous to finally have as Commando, but a special treat nonetheless and a jewel in my collection. I remember back during that time, Mr. Broxton, passionate Horner fan that he also is, made me a mix tape (several, actually) of his favorite Horner selections from the time and mailed them to me as well. All the way from the U.K., at the time!
Recently, Black Gold didn’t quite do it for me, but For Greater Glory most certainly did. Not too long ago I did acquire Wolf Totem/Le Dernier Loup and like so many others here, it’s like being transported back to their most magical period of original Horner discovery, that time when you first fell under his rapturous spell and were entranced and intoxicated by his music. Wolf Totem brought it all back for me and while I never felt as though the composer had lost his touch, I definitely felt as though he still had the mighty Midas touch and still was capable of delivering the best that Hollywood film composers, or composers in general, had to offer.
The morning I learned of Horner’s death, I opened up my laptop and scanned news headlines…when I saw a small blurb towards the bottom of the screen the first words that leapt out at me were “Titanic” and “dies” and in the first nanosecond of my eyes focusing on the picture I couldn’t read the face yet; I thought it was an actor or actress. Then I saw the word composer, and my heart sank. “Oh my god” was all I could say and my jaw dropped. Later that day, all I could listen to was Field of Dreams and I even couldn’t get all the way through that.
Since then I’ve been listening to tons of Horner and it’s as if I’ve rediscovered him. Things that may have bothered me about certain aspects of his music before don’t bother me at all, and I’m just so grateful to have his music – not only that, I’m grateful to have tons of his music, decades’ worth in fact. I’m grateful that he had such a catalog of work, that he worked so hard, so much, so often, such that he bestowed upon us these bountiful riches of scores that will live on beyond his passing. Even in this essay I’ve mentioned tons of scores but I’ve left out so many; such is a testament to how many projects he worked on. For example I don’t believe I mentioned Vibes but I really love that score. There, now I’ve worked it into the text somehow. I will say, for the record, that Jack the Bear is probably the Horner score that I’ve connected to the least. And that’s okay, everyone has their tastes, and considering how many things Horner has worked on everyone will have their favorites and the ones they choose to skip. Luckily, there are countless to choose from.
I’ve enjoyed Horner over the years of course in the typical fashion – sitting listening to a CD or my computer, driving to his music, listening to it on a stereo somewhere. In addition to the normal venues, though, Horner has scored my life in other ways: he’s been there with me when I’ve exercised (“Ambush” from Clear and Present Danger, “Going After Newt” from Aliens, “The Hit” from Patriot Games, etc.); he’s been there with me when I’ve gone hiking (The Journey of Natty Gann, The New World, Mighty Joe Young); he’s been there with me on the occasional romantic encounter (selections from Legends of the Fall, Braveheart, Titanic, The New World, etc.); and of course his beautiful music has helped pick me up when I’ve been down, or lost.
I could go on about how Horner’s passing has affected me, but I think I’ve written far too much already and I think that the length of my writing has spoken for itself. I really just wanted to speak to how much he’s given us by writing this much, by mentioning so many scores, by writing about so many different eras of my journey with Horner through time. He helped introduce me to film music and he helped show me how amazing it can be. There is no doubt that he has always been, to my ears, one of the very best composers around and the guy that was the most capable of consistently writing the most beautiful music I could imagine. How he had access to such a deep well of incredible creative sensitivity and artistic beauty was a lovely mystery. I think Jerry Goldsmith is the best composer I’ve ever listened to and I think Marco Beltrami is my favorite composer that I’ve ever listened to, but I do think that James Horner is the composer who has always written the most heartfelt music and who has always been the most adept at cutting right to the emotions of all of us, of humanity, and for that I will always be in awe, and will always be listening to his music.
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Well done, Deputy. And a nice illustration of how for some of us movies and their music become inextricably linked with our lives growing up.
I came to Horner just enough later (in my mid twenties) that he feels secondary to my initial favorites (Goldsmith and Williams, of course) - not as a talent, just in my self-defined tiers of favorites. It's refreshing to see how his music sort of grew up with you and you with it. And it shows that the tendency for film composers to tackle so many different genres and approaches can be a kind of roadmap for the range of human experience and imagination that films represent, and that film music translates into an art that can be enjoyed linked-to but separate-from the films.
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Bumped because I want an answer from "Mr. Complete Score Breakdown." 
Oh! Well, it was a combination. My parents weren't that cool...although my Dad did take me to see T2 in the theaters at age 12...but I had to sneak to see Total Recall at a friend's house on VHS, and even the violence shocked me, yikes. All of the others I caught when they broadcast on the CBS/ABC/NBC Sunday/Saturday Night movie which they used to do a lot back then, editing out the violence and substituting silly words for swear words, like the infamous Die Hard 2 edited version. That's how I saw most of my R-rated movies as a kid, like those Schwarzenegger pictures, Robocop, etc. Loved those Saturday/Sunday night TV broadcasts, which allowed me to see the movies, without the violence and swearing, which was ok at the time because I didn't know what I was missing and just wanted to see the movie anyway.
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