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German-born composer Hans Zimmer has been nominated for seven Academy
Awards, including his music for “Gladiator”, “As Good As
It Gets”, “Crimson Tide” and “The Preacher’s
Wife”. In 1998, he was nominated for two Academy Awards: Best
Dramatic Score for “The Thin Red Line” and Best Musical/Comedy
Score for “The Prince of Egypt”.After working on “Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron” last year, Zimmer decided to take on a darker adventure by scoring “The Ring”, a remake of the Japanese horror classic. “After I did this kids’ film, I needed an antidote to the sweetness — I had to go over to my dark side”, he says with a wicked grin. “I usually spend more time on my dark side”. Zimmer is also working on director Ridley Scott’s latest film, “Matchstick Men”, as well as “The Last Samurai”, an epic that takes place in the 1870s. “It’s like ‘Gladiator’ in Japan”, he says. Working With Lisa Gerrard Zimmer pauses to reflect on the “Gladiator” experience. He and Ridley Scott lured eclectic music goddess Lisa Gerrard — known for her work with Dead Can Dance and as a solo artist — into helping with the score. “Lisa didn’t really want to do it when we first phoned her”, he says. “So Ridley did what every good director does — he sent her the film and said, ‘Let’s wait and see what she says after she watches the movie’. “Well, she phoned up straight away and said ‘I’m on the next plane from Australia’”, he recalls. Gerrard was originally supposed to come over for three days. But she ended up staying for three months. “Things started loosening up in the studio”, he says. “Lisa wasn’t just singing my things, she was really contributing and writing her own stuff. It was so great. Collaborative Composing “I like working in a collaborative way”, says Zimmer. “I’m not very ego-driven about being ‘The Composer’. Whoever brings in great ideas should be welcomed. I think it was really good for Lisa — tough, but sort of fun, too. And Ridley is great to work with”. 
“‘Gladiator’ is actually two things”, says Zimmer.
“It’s a very structured, thorough score with a very German
intellect at work. And then it needed those moments of feminine
looseness, which Lisa contributed. Those moments worked like little
experiments, little tunes we would develop instinctively.“The great thing about Lisa is that sometimes she’d be in my room and I’d be writing differently because her presence and influence were there”, he reflects. “So that was great. Lisa’s got all these computers, but I think in a secret way she fights the technology all the time”. Next page: Learning About Orchestras |
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