Which composer’s music accompanies the opening of Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey?

Richard Strauss’s music accompanies the opening of Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey.

The film opens with the sunrise section of Also sprach Zarathustra, a tone poem composed by Richard Strauss in 1896. Its powerful brass fanfare and rising orchestral statement play over the alignment of the Sun, Earth, and Moon, creating one of cinema’s most recognizable openings.

Richard Strauss should not be confused with Johann Strauss II, whose Blue Danube waltz is also prominently used later in the film during the docking sequence. The two composers share a surname but lived in different periods and wrote different works.

Kubrick originally considered using an original score, but temporary classical recordings became so effective during the editing process that he retained them. The finished film therefore uses classical works by composers including Richard Strauss, Johann Strauss II, and György Ligeti rather than a conventional newly commissioned dramatic score.