Almost 50 years ago, theatres around the world were blasted into a galaxy far, far away with the very first notes of composer John Williams' STAR WARS main title theme. Since then, what's followed is a near half-century legacy of music, transporting us from a NEW HOPE to a rich world of spun off characters and storylines. 

Taking up the sonic mantle for the latest cinematic entry in an already iconic franchise, is composer Ludwig Göransson. The three-time Oscar^® winner is more than up to the task. He's the favored collaborator of a real murderers' row of IMAX auteurs, including Christopher Nolan, Ryan Coogler, and now Jon Favreau. 

He sat down with us to chat STAR WARS, IMAX, and why composing is about more than a melody.

Read on and then get your tickets to experience STAR WARS: THE MANDALORIAN AND GROGU in IMAX, now playing.

Having worked on other Filmed for IMAX projects like SINNERS and OPPENHEIMER, how does the larger-than-life scope of the medium inform your process? Having worked in television as well as cinema, do you find the processes to differ?

You always have to think about, what kind of experience are you creating? What is this experience that we're trying to create with this film? 

All the way from the get-go, when we started The Mandalorian season one, I was always treating it like I would a film project. We spent lots of time recording, mixing, and wanting to hear it on the big screen, on the big speakers. That’s what I was thinking about originally. 

Now, to get that chance and option to fully realize our initial idea of the music and the sound, it helps your momentum because you're putting so much time and effort into every little detail. Just understanding and knowing that the audience is going to experience it exactly the same way that you presented it is...I feel very grateful for that opportunity. 

You've worked with some stellar directors. What is it like to collaborate with different filmmakers? Do you have a sort of set vision going into your projects or is each one different for you?

Everyone's very different. What I do love about my collaborators is that they really appreciate and value my opinion. Both when I write music, but also in post, after I'm done and we're sitting there at the mix stage, at the dub stage. Just me delivering the score doesn't mean that I'm done. 

The big part, the biggest, one of the most important parts, is actually making sure that it sounds the way it was intended.

For example, with SINNERS, we created this immersive experience with this montage where you see all these different musicians coming in and the camera swirling around, and you hear that and experience that in IMAX. It was an experience you have never been a part of before, as an audience member. 

Were you a big STAR WARS fan growing up?

I was a huge STAR WARS fan. I mean, I was actually more of a STAR WARS music fan. 

Obviously I love STAR WARS, but the music was what was, as with so many others, one of the things that inspired me to do what I do. John Williams' legacy and John Williams' creation of the STAR WARS universe, that still lingers on forever. As a child, that's what stuck with me, the images of Darth Vader with that music. 

Do you have a favorite scene or moment in the movie that fans should particularly keep an eye and an ear out for?

Something that I thought was really fun, there's a scene when Rotta [the Hutt] is fighting against Mandalorian. It’s called the “Pit Fight.” Something that I love to do with music and score is to incorporate sound elements in the sound design. 

So, there's a lot of that in this movie. The alarms that you hear in the beginning, that is actually part of the music. That's part of the score. Using those alarms made me able to map out the tempo of the score in a way that moves in the same tempo as the alarms essentially.  

For the Pit Fight, what I was doing when I was writing the score, was creating the ambience of the crowd. Using that together with score, thinking about almost the crowd as a music element, and how the score can respond to that back and forth. 

Then being there at the dub stage when we're mixing this, working together with the incredible Skywalker Sound team, creating that ambience, letting the music and the sound design breathe together, and be coming from the same place, creating that 360 immersive experience with both sound and music...I think that's very interesting and I love digging deeper into that. 

Do you have any advice for younger fans who might want to follow in your footsteps one day?

My advice is kind of what we're talking about. Don't think of music as just a singular thing that has to be melody or drums or rhythm. Incorporate everything. It's all about building a world, a sound world. Building an experience for the audience that they’ve never been through before. That sound world is what you hear. What do you hear? Music and sound. 

From a sound perspective, what might you say to someone who is on the fence about watching this film in theatres versus, say, at home on their phone?

You know, that's, whatever experience you want to have for yourself is, whatever you're comfortable with, is totally, totally fine. 

Do you want to have the full experience, or is that going to be too much for you? [laughs] 

If there was any film you could watch again, for the first time in IMAX, what would it be?

Probably the first movie I saw in IMAX was THE DARK KNIGHT. I would probably go back and watch that again. It was a midnight screening, and the theater was so packed. The seats I got were in the front to the right, and so that experience was incredible, but I wish I could have seen that one more time and sitting in the center.  

Experience STAR WARS: THE MANDALORIAN AND GROGU in IMAX, now playing

This interview was transcribed from a Zoom conversation. It has been edited for clarity and length.

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