Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

In March 2015, it was reported that Alexandre Desplat, who worked with Edwards on the Godzilla reboot, would compose the score for Rogue One. Despite rumors that a contract had not been initially set in place by Lucasfilm, Desplat had confirmed in an April 2016 interview that he would serve as composer for the film. Concerning the film, Desplat commented that "[Edwards and I] had a great partnership on Godzilla, and I can't wait to be starting with him. It will be in a few weeks from now, and it is very exciting and frightening at the same time because it's such a legendary project. To be called to come after John Williams... it's a great challenge for me."

However, in September 2016, it was announced that Michael Giacchino would be replacing Desplat as composer, after the film's reshoots altered the post-production schedule and reportedly left Desplat no longer available. Giacchino only had four and a half weeks to compose the music for the film, beginning almost immediately after finishing production on Doctor Strange. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly in November 2016, Giacchino stated: "It is a film that is in many ways a really great World War II movie, and I loved that about it. But it also has this huge, huge heart at the center of it, and that was the one thing I just didn’t want to discount. Yes, it’s an action movie, and it’s a Star Wars film, and it has all the things that you would come to expect and love about that, but I didn’t want to forget that it was also an incredibly emotional movie as well. That was what really pulled me in." Giacchino incorporated John Williams' themes from previous films into the score.


It does borrow from traditions that both John Williams and George Lucas borrowed from when they made the original Star Wars, you know. George was looking at Flash Gordon, the old serials, and John was looking at Gustav Holst and different composers along the way to get a baseline for what he wanted to communicate. There is a wonderful musical language that John put together for the original films. I wanted to honor that vernacular but still do something new with it, something that was still me in a way.
 

—Michael Giacchino on balancing the musical traditions of Star Wars with his original music for the standalone Rogue One


The official soundtrack will be released by Walt Disney Records on December 16, 2016.