62 Facts About Hans Zimmer

1.

Hans Florian Zimmer is a German film score composer and music producer.

2.

Hans Zimmer has won two Oscars and four Grammys, and has been nominated for two Emmys and a Tony.

3.

Hans Zimmer's works are notable for integrating electronic music sounds with traditional orchestral arrangements.

4.

Since the 1980s, Hans Zimmer has composed music for over 150 films.

5.

Hans Zimmer has won two Academy Awards for Best Original Score for The Lion King, and Dune.

6.

Hans Zimmer's works include Gladiator, The Last Samurai, the Pirates of the Caribbean series, The Dark Knight trilogy, Inception, Man of Steel, Interstellar, and Dunkirk.

7.

Hans Zimmer spent the early part of his career in the United Kingdom before moving to the United States.

8.

Hans Zimmer is the head of the film music division at DreamWorks Pictures and DreamWorks Animation studios and works with other composers through the company that he founded, Remote Control Productions, formerly known as Media Ventures.

9.

Hans Zimmer has collaborated on multiple projects with directors including Ridley Scott, Ron Howard, Gore Verbinski, Michael Bay, Guy Ritchie, Denis Villeneuve, and Christopher Nolan.

10.

Hans Zimmer was born on 12 September 1957 in Frankfurt, West Germany.

11.

Hans Zimmer moved to London as a teenager and attended Hurtwood House school.

12.

Hans Zimmer began his career playing keyboards and synthesizers in the 1970s, with the band Krakatoa.

13.

Hans Zimmer worked with the Buggles, a new wave band formed in London in 1977 with Trevor Horn, Geoff Downes, and Bruce Woolley.

14.

Hans Zimmer can be seen briefly in the Buggles' music video for the 1979 song "Video Killed the Radio Star".

15.

Hans Zimmer was a featured synthesist for Krisma's third album, Cathode Mamma.

16.

Together, Myers and Hans Zimmer worked on fusing the traditional orchestral sound with electronic instruments.

17.

Hans Zimmer acted as score producer for the 1987 film The Last Emperor, which won the Academy Award for Best Original Score.

18.

Hollywood director Barry Levinson was looking for someone to score Rain Man, and his wife heard the soundtrack CD of the anti-apartheid drama A World Apart, for which Hans Zimmer had composed the music.

19.

Hans Zimmer wrote the theme for Tony Scott's 1993 film True Romance, which he based on Carl Orff's Gassenhauer.

20.

Hans Zimmer said that he had wanted to go to South Africa to record parts of the soundtrack, but was unable to visit the country as he had a police record there "for doing 'subversive' movies" after his work on The Power of One.

21.

Disney studio bosses expressed fears that Zimmer would be killed if he went to South Africa, so the recording of the choirs was organised during a visit by Lebo M Zimmer won numerous awards for his work on The Lion King, including an Academy Award for Best Original Score, a Golden Globe, and two Grammys.

22.

Hans Zimmer introduced Ofra Haza, an Israeli Yemenite singer, to the directors, and they thought she was so beautiful that they designed one of the characters in the film to look like her.

23.

Hans Zimmer composed the theme for the television boxing series The Contender and worked with Lorne Balfe on the music for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, which was his first video game project.

24.

Hans Zimmer collaborated with composers Borislav Slavov and Tilman Sillescu to create the score for the video game Crysis 2.

25.

In October 2000, Hans Zimmer performed live in concert for the first time with an orchestra and choir at the 27th Annual Flanders International Film Festival in Ghent.

26.

Hans Zimmer began doing extensive research, but the more he studied, the less he felt he knew.

27.

Finally, Hans Zimmer took what he had written to Japan for feedback and was shocked when he was asked how he knew so much about Japanese music.

28.

Hans Zimmer provided some themes that were used in the film, although he is not credited on screen.

29.

Hans Zimmer was hired as the composer for the three subsequent films in the series, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, and Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, collaborating with Rodrigo y Gabriela for the last.

30.

Hans Zimmer is noted for his work on the scores of Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, which he co-composed with James Newton Howard.

31.

Hans Zimmer succeeded in reversing the decision not to nominate The Dark Knight in December 2008, arguing that the process of creating a modern film score was collaborative and that it was important to credit a range of people who had played a part in its production.

32.

Hans Zimmer explained his approach to scoring with other musicians in an interview with Soundtrack.

33.

Hans Zimmer was more than just a soloist, and this is why I have such a problem with specific credits.

34.

In 2012, Hans Zimmer composed and produced the music for the 84th Academy Awards with Pharrell Williams of The Neptunes.

35.

Hans Zimmer composed a new version of the theme music for ABC World News.

36.

Hans Zimmer composed the score for The Dark Knight Rises, the final instalment of Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight Trilogy.

37.

Hans Zimmer co-composed the music for the television series The Bible, which was broadcast in March 2013, with Lorne Balfe and Lisa Gerrard, and the score for 12 Years a Slave, which won the Academy Award for Best Picture in March 2014.

38.

Hans Zimmer composed the Tomorrowland Hymn for the Tomorrowland festival to celebrate its tenth anniversary in July 2014.

39.

Hans Zimmer composed the music for the 2014 film The Amazing Spider-Man 2 alongside "The Magnificent Six", which consisted of Pharrell Williams, Johnny Marr, Michael Einziger, Junkie XL, Andrew Kawczynski, and Steve Mazzaro.

40.

Hans Zimmer composed the music for Christopher Nolan's 2014 film Interstellar, which earned him another Academy Award nomination for Best Original Score.

41.

Hans Zimmer partnered with Junkie XL to compose the music for the 2016 film Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

42.

Hans Zimmer composed the main theme for the 2016 BBC nature documentary Planet Earth II, presented by David Attenborough.

43.

Hans Zimmer later composed the score for the 2017 BBC nature documentary Blue Planet II alongside Jacob Shea and David Fleming, presented by David Attenborough.

44.

Hans Zimmer composed the main theme for the 2016 Netflix production The Crown.

45.

Also in 2016 Hans Zimmer released an online course teaching the basics of film scoring.

46.

Hans Zimmer next composed the score for Christopher Nolan's 2017 film Dunkirk, basing part of the score on a recording of a ticking watch that he had been given by Nolan.

47.

Hans Zimmer worked on the score for Denis Villeneuve's Blade Runner 2049.

48.

In 2018, Hans Zimmer composed the score for the new FIFA Anthem, called "Living Football" in reference to the new motto of FIFA, "Living Football" was used as television intro theme for the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia.

49.

Also in 2018, Hans Zimmer remixed the UEFA Champions League Anthem with rapper Vince Staples for EA Sports' FIFA video game FIFA 19, with it featuring in the game's reveal trailer.

50.

Hans Zimmer composed the score for Dark Phoenix, directed by Simon Kinberg, contrary to his 2016 statements of not scoring another superhero film following his experience working on Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

51.

On 22 August 2018, Hans Zimmer was announced as the composer for Wonder Woman 1984.

52.

On 18 March 2019, it was announced that Hans Zimmer would be scoring Denis Villeneuve's Dune.

53.

In June 2019, Hans Zimmer was hired to create sounds for BMW's concept vehicle, the Vision M Next.

54.

Hans Zimmer composed the score for the film Dune, which earned him his second Academy Award for Best Original Score.

55.

Hans Zimmer is set to compose the score for the sequel.

56.

Hans Zimmer has produced and composed sounds for BMW's electric car line.

57.

On 3 April 2020, Hans Zimmer filed for divorce from his second wife, Suzanne Hans Zimmer, with whom he has three children.

58.

Hans Zimmer has received a range of honours and awards, including the Max Steiner Film Music Achievement Award at Hollywood in Vienna in 2018, the Career Achievement Award "for excellence in film music composition" from the National Board of Review in 2003, the Frederick Loewe Award for Film Composing at the Palm Springs International Film Festival in 2003, the ASCAP Henry Mancini Award in 2003, and the Richard Kirk Career Achievement Award from the BMI Film Music Awards in 1996.

59.

In December 2010, Hans Zimmer received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

60.

Hans Zimmer dedicated the award to his publicist and long-term friend Ronni Chasen, who had been shot and killed in Beverly Hills the previous month.

61.

In 2016, Hans Zimmer was one of the inaugural winners of the Stephen Hawking Medal for Science Communication.

62.

On 2 October 2018, Hans Zimmer received the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany.