Joseph Trapanese

Joseph Trapanese has built a reputation chiefly through the atmospheric, foreboding scores he supplied for major films including Oblivion in 2013, Straight Outta Compton in 2015, and the Raid series. His catalog further encompasses the blockbuster musical The Greatest Showman from 2017 and lighter action-comedy fare such as Stuber in 2019. Outside motion pictures, his contributions reach television, theater, and video games, while behind-the-scenes studio work has linked him with recording artists such as Dr. Dre, Moby, and Kelly Clarkson.

A New Jersey native, Trapanese received his B.A. in composition from the Manhattan School of Music, then earned an M.A. in music for visual media at UCLA, where he taught electronic music and composition from 2008 to 2011. During those years he also began partnering with various mainstream acts. His initial major opportunity arrived in 2010 when he assisted Daft Punk on the expansive electronic soundtrack for Disney’s Tron reboot and sequel.

He next joined Mike Shinoda of Linkin Park to score the American release of the 2011 Indonesian martial-arts film The Raid: Redemption and returned alone for The Raid 2 in 2014. That same period brought arrangement duties on several tracks from M83’s breakthrough album Hurry Up, We're Dreaming, which in turn led to their collaboration on the 2013 Tom Cruise sci-fi epic Oblivion. He additionally reworked Moby’s “Extreme Ways” for The Bourne Legacy.

Subsequent scoring highlights include Earth to Echo in 2014, Insurgent—the second installment of The Divergent Series—in 2015, and the landmark rap biopic Straight Outta Compton also in 2015. In the studio he continued working with M83 and Moby while adding Active Child, Dr. Dre, Kelly Clarkson, 3OH!3, and Dia Frampton (as the duo Archis).

Trapanese co-composed the score for 2017’s The Greatest Showman with John Debney, complementing songs by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul. His music appeared in 2018 in the adventure films Arctic and Robin Hood starring Taron Egerton, as well as the USA Network series Unsolved: The Murders of Tupac and the Notorious B.I.G. The detective-and-ridesharing comedy Stuber reached theaters with his contributions in 2019.