Music inspires powerful emotions on screen, just like in real life

Just try to imagine replacing John Williams’ “Jaws” theme during the first swimming casualty in the movie with a calm piece of music.

Underappreciated are the amazing soundtracks of John Carpenter; who did double duty directing and composing.

It's hard to imagine Blade Runner without the music by Vangelis. It really captured a wistfulness that permeates the film.

Consider how the original 'Star Trek' theme has been used over the years. And Ennio Morricone's theme (and use of incidental music) in 'The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly'.

Music plays a really important part in Kdrama and the OSTs sell well. So well that labels like Pony Canyon often release them in Japan. If the Korean original has gone off sale by the time you catch the drama, check for a Japanese release, as it may be cheaper than a 2nd hand copy of the original Korean release.

Some of the tracks do not appear outside the OST and are by major artists like Taeyeon or Davichi. Check this out. From 'Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryeo', it is the classical soprano Im Sunhae singing the hauntingly beautiful 'I Will Definitely Come Back'. Kdrama may offer some of the best synthesis of images and music to stir the emotions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHpUD1mYBXs

In Japan, intro and outro themes, particularly from anime, are hot sellers. Some artists specialise in them. For me, the best anime track is fripSide's 'Only My Railgun'. I'm partial being a fan of fripSide.

Here's a cosplaying orchestra playing it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95dRQxAo4G0

Music is so important for moving images, that a few bars of the theme tune from a TV series or movie you last saw 30 years ago, will bring it straight back.

Most underrated composer is the late, great James Horner. Most people only know him for Titanic, but he has done the scores for Avatar, Braveheart, Legends of the Fall, An American Tail, Land Before Time, Willow, Jumanji, and the list truly goes on! That man knew EXACTLY how to capture all manner of emotions with the sound of a single instrument, a single chord, a single line of score. He was incredible.

Most underrated composer is the late, great James Horner.

His work scoring the battles in Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan is magnificent.

dagonToday  03:20 pm JST

His work scoring the battles in Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan is magnificent.

I knew I was forgetting to mention some other greats from him! The new Avatar movie and new Willow TV series will be released soon, but it's hard to imagine them without James Horner around to score them...

The next time you’re watching a movie, or even a favorite TV show, pay attention to the way a scene makes you feel – and then listen for its music.

Until it’s used too much. Ron “crescendo happy” Howard goes way too far. And too many movies these days use it as a filler or selling an album. If I hear more than three different pop/rap/whatever bad songs in the first 5 minutes it’s gone.

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Agreed about the filler music / music just for selling an album, FizzBit. Movie scores are my favorite kind of music, so those movies that can't seem to produce their own scores to help tell the story and rely purely on pop music (and the fans of that pop music to boost movie ticket sales) will always lose me.

TV shows from the early 60's used to have decent unique soundtracks - gave employment to a lot of musicians. By the 70s that was gone.