A soundtrack can carry a visual along, be an unforgettable addition to the film and sometimes there is a small moment of something really great, which exists as beautiful music on its own merit.

Wings of a Film: The Music of Hans Zimmer.

With animated film, you have to create the sonic world; there's nothing there. You get to color things in more and you're allowed to overreach yourself a little bit more, and it's great fun.

Gladiator.

The writing gets done away from the keyboard and away from the studio in my head, in solitude. And then I come in and hopefully have something, then I wrestle with sounds and picture all day long. But the ideas usually come from a more obscure place, like a conversation with a director, a still somebody shows you, or whatever.

Here's something I probably shouldn't be saying: I never listen to my soundtrack albums because I can't stand it. It's just stereo. When I write, I write in surround. My life is in surround.