James Horner is an American composer, conductor and orchestrator of orchestral and film music has an estimated net worth of $15 million. Born James Roy Horner on August 14, 1953 in Los Angeles, California, he started playing piano at the age of five, then spent his early years in London where he attended the Royal College of Music.
Horner later went to Verde Valley High School then earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music from the University of Southern California. He then attended the University of California where he earned his doctorate in Music Composition and Theory. He had several scoring assignments with the American Film Institute in the 1970s then finished his teaching of music theory at UCLA before he turned to film scoring.
In 1979, James Horner did his first film score for The Lady in Red. His first high-profile project came in 1982 when he composed the music for Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Since then, he has worked his way to several film offers and opportunities to work with world-class performers, such as the London Symphony Orchestra. In the 1980s, he composed a classical concert piece called Spectral Shimmers, which was first performed by the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra.
To date, he has more than 75 projects to his name, and has worked with George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, James Cameron, Oliver Stone and Ron Howard. In 1998, he won two Academy Awards: Best Original Dramatic Score for Titanic and Best Original Song for My Heart Will Go On, and has an additional eight Oscar nominations. He has earned two Golden Globe Awards, three Satellite Awards, three Saturn Awards, and has three nominations for British Academy Film Awards.
On June 22, 2015, Horner’s sudden demise from a plane crash shocked the entertainment industry. He survived his wife, Sarah and two children.