Scoring the Screen

Name: Scoring the Screen
Price: 190 AUD
Availability: OutOfStock
ISBN: 9781538163474

The Secret Language of Music for Film and Visual Media

Andy Hill

$190

Hardback

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English

Rowman & Littlefield
28 May 2026

Films, movies & cinema; Musicals; Techniques of music & music tutorials

Series: Music Pro Guides

This widely acclaimed book enables readers to understand and practice the language of music composed for film, video games,

and other visual media.

Film and television music veteran Andy Hill offers an insider’s view of what goes into the creation of the musical score for major motion pictures and other works of screen entertainment, including video games. This unique text provides deeply informed, measure-by-measure analysis of highly detailed reductions of music cues from more than two dozen films composed by the top composers, among them Howard Shore, Danny Elfman, Ennio Morricone, and Bernard Herrmann, as well as trailblazers of today.

New chapters in the second edition tackle:

-

Howard Shore’s Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers -

The Music of the Disney Renaissance, featuring analyses of Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and The Lion King -

Women in film music, featuring interviews with Rachel Portman, Pinar Toprak, Natalie Holt, and Stephanie Economou -

Adaptive music for games, featuring analyses of game scores by Austin Wintory (Journey and Abzu), Garry Schyman (Bioshock), and Mikolai Stroinski (The Witcher)

Hill’s powerful insights informed by music theory and the scenes of composition, as well as first-hand input from many of the artists themselves, enables readers to witness the composition of the score from the first motive to the last bar. This indispensable resource provides a close-up look at the musical conventions and tricks-of-the-trade that composers use to express the full range of human (and sometimes non-human) experience, allowing music students, practicing composers, and aficionados of the craft to better understand and hone its power.

By: Andy Hill
Imprint: Rowman & Littlefield
Country of Publication: United States
Edition: 2nd edition
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm,
ISBN: 9781538163474
ISBN 10: 1538163470
Series: Music Pro Guides
Pages: 384
Publication Date: 28 May 2026
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Andy Hill is a veteran of the film and television music industry, former Vice-President of Music Production for Walt Disney Studios, Grammy Award-winning music producer, founder of the MFA program in Music Composition for the Screen at Columbia College Chicago, USA, and author of five published novels of speculative fiction. Films for which he served as executive in charge of music production have earned nine Academy Awards in music categories. He has served as Dean of the Film Scoring Academy of Europe, Bulgaria, since 2019.

Reviews for Scoring the Screen: The Secret Language of Music for Film and Visual Media

A beautifully detailed treatise. -- Howard Shore * Grammy and Academy Award-winning composer, The Lord of the Rings * From the first page to the last, the first edition of Scoring the Screen was a must read for anyone interested in film scoring. This second edition beautifully expands on the insights shared in the original edition. Hill’s ability to synthesize his thoughts, through careful analysis of the music into a coherent theory on the techniques shared by many of the greatest scores is a gift to the field. -- Jay Weigel * Grammy award-winning composer and producer * Going back to my earliest days writing scores for Disney Animation, Andy Hill has impressed me as a passionate and knowledgeable spokesman for those of us who create music. I couldn’t imagine a better guide to explore the world of film music, and I’m delighted that he has written this thoughtful and informative book. -- Alan Menken * EGOT-winning composer, The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast *