Wojciech Kilar (17 July 1932 - 29 December 2013) was a Polish composer whose career developed along two closely connected paths: concert music and film scoring. Born in Lwow, then part of Poland and now Lviv, Ukraine, he spent most of his professional life in Katowice. He became one of the leading figures of postwar Polish music and gained an international audience through his work for directors including Andrzej Wajda, Krzysztof Zanussi, Roman Polanski and Francis Ford Coppola.
Kilar began studying piano in Rzeszow and Krakow before moving to Katowice, where he studied at the State Higher School of Music under Wladyslawa Markiewiczowna and Boleslaw Woytowicz. He graduated with distinction in 1955 and continued his education in Krakow. In 1959 and 1960, a French government scholarship allowed him to study composition in Paris with Nadia Boulanger. He also took part in the influential Darmstadt courses for new music.
During the 1960s, Kilar was associated with the Polish avant-garde, alongside Krzysztof Penderecki and Henryk Gorecki. His early works explored sonorism, dense orchestral textures and unusual instrumental combinations. Pieces such as Riff 62, Generique and Diphtongos established his reputation at the Warsaw Autumn festival, an important forum for contemporary music. Although these works reflected the experimental spirit of the period, Kilar's music retained a strong sense of rhythm, directness and dramatic shape.
From the 1970s onward, he increasingly moved toward a more concentrated and communicative style. His orchestral works often combined powerful repetition with references to Polish highland music and Catholic tradition. Krzesany became one of his best-known concert pieces, using sharply etched rhythms and monumental orchestral sonorities to evoke the Tatra Mountains. Other major works include Orawa, Exodus, Angelus and Missa pro pace. These compositions helped establish him not only as a film composer but as a major Polish symphonic voice.
Kilar wrote music for more than a hundred films. His long association with Polish cinema produced scores for films such as Wajda's The Promised Land and The Wedding, Zanussi's The Structure of Crystal and Polanski's The Shadow Line. His film music was usually economical in its materials but highly expressive, using recurring rhythms, stark harmonies and broad orchestral gestures to shape atmosphere and emotional tension.
International recognition came with Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992), whose dark, romantic score introduced Kilar's sound to a much wider audience. He later collaborated with Polanski on The Ninth Gate and The Pianist. For The Pianist, he received the 2003 Cesar Award for best film music. He also wrote the score for Andrzej Wajda's Pan Tadeusz, including its famous polonaise, which became one of his most recognizable cinematic themes.
Despite his success in Hollywood and European cinema, Kilar regarded concert composition as his central artistic pursuit. His film scores were not a separate commercial exercise but another setting in which his interest in ritual, memory, national identity and spiritual experience could be expressed. He was awarded Poland's Order of the White Eagle in 2012. Kilar died in Katowice in 2013, leaving a body of work that joined modernist experimentation with unmistakable Polish character.