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Among the hundreds of things the pandemic has affected is the way composers work as recording sessions became virtual. But thanks to vaccines and Covid-safe plans in the the past year, in-person sessions were (mostly) back, though not to normal — and it was a welcome return for our five Meet the Experts: Composers roundtable panelists Daniel Pemberton (“Being the Ricardos”), Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe (“Candyman”), Germaine Franco (“Encanto”), Carter Burwell (“The Tragedy of Macbeth”) and Nicholas Britell (“Don’t Look Up“).

For Pemberton, the Oscar nominee doesn’t believe his orchestral score for the Aaron Sorkin film would exist had he not been able to record it in person. “We got 70 people in a room and we got super lucky because I got to go there and it was just fantastic being in the room with all those people. And Covid restrictions had just changed in Britain so we could get 70 people,...

For composer Hans Zimmer, scoring “Dune” was a dream come true. He read Frank Herbert’s massive sci-fi novel when he was 18 and has revisited it often, imagining the sounds of the desert planet Arrakis, the sandworms and the invaluable spice that makes interstellar travel possible.

“The first person I talked to was Hans,” director Denis Villeneuve reports. The two were finishing work on 2017’s “Blade Runner 2049” at the time, and the composer became “obsessed with the idea of trying to create music from another world, from another time.”

Nothing in the 11-time Oscar nominee’s 37-year, 140-film career sounds like “Dune.” Eerie, ominous and dramatic, it is a unique mix of choral, world-music, rock and electronic sounds created by friends and colleagues on three continents.

“It sounds great until you realize you’re the one who has to deal with all the different time zones,” quips the composer.

The Pink Floyd cover in the Dune trailer was worked out over FaceTime by composer Hans Zimmer. The trailer for Denis Villeneuve's highly anticipated take on Frank Herbert's iconic book of the same name features a cover of the band's 1973 song "Eclipse" from the Dark Side of the Moon. Much like the reworked version of Nirvana's "Something in the Way" from The Batman trailer, Pink Floyd has seen a major sales uptick, thanks to the new Zimmer and Villeneuve collaboration.

Hans Zimmer has spent most of his time during the public health crisis scoring Dune with all original music. However, he did take a break to conduct a choir over FaceTime from his home studio for the Pink Floyd cover. The composer worked with a 32-piece choir with 4 singers at a time, over the course of 8 sessions remotely. 12 singers provided the main vocals, while 20 provided the choral backing for "Eclipse.

Warner Bros.’ much-buzzed-about release of the “Dune” official trailer last week represented a full circle moment for the relationship between Frank Herbert’s science-fiction novel and the rock band Pink Floyd. Back when Alejandro Jodorowsky was attempting to mount a “Dune” film adaptation in the 1970s, the director courted Pink Floyd to write the original score. The film failed to materialize, but Pink Floyd found its way back to “Dune,” as the trailer for Villeneuve’s upcoming tentpole featured a cover of the band’s song “Eclipse” from the 1973 album “Dark Side of the Moon.”

A new report from Variety confirms it was Hans Zimmer himself who was behind the reworking of “Eclipse” for the “Dune” trailer. The Oscar-winner has spent a majority of quarantine finishing the original score for “Dune,” and he took a break from the main score to oversee the recording of the Pink Floyd cover. Working...

The trailer for “Dune,” the upcoming adaptation of the Frank Herbert sci-fi classic, has introduced a 47-year-old Pink Floyd song to thousands, if not millions, of new listeners.

That director Denis Villeneuve chose “Eclipse,” from the English band’s 1973 “Dark Side of the Moon” album, as the key musical element in the three-minute video, came as a surprise – especially considering most trailers are not scored by the film’s actual composer, much less a specially tailored cover of a classic rock song. (“Eclipse” was written by Roger Waters whose publishing is with BMG.)

“Dune” composer Hans Zimmer confirmed that he conceived the new version for the trailer, although he declined Variety’s request for an interview about it. He did, however, tweet the film’s signature ad line and his excitement (“this is a childhood dream come true for me!”) on the morning of Sept. 9, the day the trailer dropped.

Icelandic composer Hildur Guðnadóttir continued her winning streak, claiming top honors for both her “Joker” and “Chernobyl” scores at Tuesday night’s inaugural awards of the Society of Composers & Lyricists at Los Angeles’ Skirball Cultural Center.

Her music for “Joker” was named outstanding original score for a studio film and her score for HBO’s “Chernobyl” was cited as outstanding original score for a television or streaming production. They followed her Golden Globe win Sunday night for “Joker” and BAFTA nomination earlier Tuesday. She won the Emmy in September for her score to the HBO miniseries “Chernobyl.”

Guðnadóttir is among the most talked-about newcomers in film music, first for her “Chernobyl” score (built largely on sounds she recorded while visiting the nuclear power plant where it was shot) and more recently her “Joker” music (her electro-acoustic cello providing the accompaniment for star Joaquin Phoenix’s on-screen dancing). She...

Elton John did not mince words. In fact, he decided to throw down the hammer regarding the 2019 remake of The Lion King and its subsequent soundtrack, which featured modern pop stars like (Beyoncé, Donald Glover) and actors with varying degrees of vocal talent (Seth Rogen, Billy Eichner) seeking to recapture the magic of the 1994 original.

“The new version of The Lion King was a huge disappointment to me, because I believe they messed the music up,” Elton told British GQ. “Music was so much a part of the original and...

One of the most iconic musical moments in cinematic history was a spur-of-the-moment freestyle, recorded for a demo for a movie that many thought would be overshadowed by a beautiful cartoon from Disney: Pocahontas. In 1994, though, The Lion King began with an animated sun rising against a crimson sky, a now-legendary voice booming “Nants ingonyama bagithi baba.” Nothing would eclipse it.

“As I was leaving the studio I saw the image of Mufasa, and I asked what’s that about, and I was told that’s the king arriving.

Composer Hans Zimmer is seated at the mixing board at the Sony scoring stage, head bobbing to the music being performed by 107 musicians just a few yards away. He’s wearing a vintage “Lion King World Tour” T-shirt, frayed at the collar.

On the giant screen behind the orchestra, two lions are bounding across the African veldt. As the ensemble finishes playing cue 5M31, Hans tells conductor Nick Glennie-Smith, “I like the feel — one more time, from the beginning,” while Jon Favreau, director of this new, all-computer-imagery “Lion King,” says simply, “That was pretty cool, Hans.”

Twenty-four years ago, Zimmer won an Oscar for his score for the original animated version of “The Lion King.” Since then, he has written such influential scores as “Gladiator,” “The Dark Knight” and “Inception” — yet when Favreau asked him to re-create his music for Disney’s elaborate new version, and to supervise production of...