Trailer music is a type of production music: it’s the background music used in movie previews or teasers. Editors looking for the perfect music to soundtrack their trailer hope to create anticipation around the film and briefly promote its story to audiences. Music for this form of media can sometimes be heavy on sound design and often features hybrid orchestral instrumentation, depending on the type of trailer and film subject.
Building anticipation around a movie is almost as important as the movie itself. Whether it’s transporting viewers with an epic fantasy, a tense Sci-Fi horror or a rom-com that cues the waterworks, we’ve got the perfect song for every movie moment.
Creating a captivating yet concise film trailer can be difficult, and finding the right soundtrack is essential to building suspense and excitement for a movie’s release. Set the scene for your masterpiece with a West One Music track that perfectly reflects the world built by your film.
There are many different types of trailer music, so check some of them out below.
Types of trailer music
- Popular or Commercial music: songs you might hear on the radio or at home. Licensing these songs is often expensive and might be prohibitive for many productions.
- Classical music: classical music is a popular choice because it’s often public domain, meaning no exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Check out our take on classical music with a trailerized twist, Epic Trailerized Classics.
- Library Music: these imitate recognisable popular music but at a much more accessible price point. We have a large selection of incredible music that can be used to impart a similar vibe to the top Billboard hits.
- Action trailer music: these orchestral scores and electronic hybrid cues are thrilling and aggressive. Our stock music library has many options to get hearts pumping during every action-packed second.
- Fantasy and adventure trailer music: music for fantasy films creates an atmosphere of fun and mystery and will whisk audiences away on feel-good, exciting adventures.
- Horror and thriller trailer music: twisted and eerie tracks feature dissonant strings and aggressive percussive elements. These slowly building tracks will make audiences jump out of their seats.
- Superhero trailer music: everyone loves a good superhero movie! These tracks impart superhuman strength, hidden power, a sense of terrifying evil, and victory.
- Sci-fi trailer music: electronic and synth-driven orchestral hybrid is essential to help build alien worlds and alternate dimensions.
- Emotional and dramatic trailer music: orchestral albums with choral elements deliver powerful emotions and heightened drama.
- Sound Design for trailers: from a ticking clock, ambient drones, heart pounding palpitations, sound elements for movie trailers are vital in building tension and creating immediate impact. Also, check out our curated Sound Design collection page.
Why choose us for trailer music?
Our 80,000-plus catalogue of library music speaks for itself: it’s authentically crafted by artists and composers worldwide. However, if that’s not enough to convince you, check out our label dedicated solely to trailer music, Fired Earth Music. We’ve also curated a trailer music collection that spans the breadth of our entire catalogue, featuring dozens of albums sorted by film genre.
Check out some of our trailer credits below…
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