After two seasons of scoring dinosaurs, Kara Talve and Anže Rozman approached ‘Prehistoric Planet: Ice Age’ with a different emotional palette. The duo worked with Hans Zimmer in composing the score.
“We connect with mammoths because we know how elephants look and Homotherium are just a different kind of big cat,” says Rozman. “The score is a lot more emotional in that sense because we still somehow feel the presence of these animals now.”
“It’s like a composer’s dream,” says Talve of scoring nature documentaries. “You just really have a lot of space to write big, epic, sweeping music.”
In the interview, Talve and Rozman discuss how the shift from dinosaurs to Ice Age animals changed the emotional direction of the score, the challenges of scoring natural history and the importance of capturing the weight and scale of the megafauna. They also explain how they divided the composing duties, worked with footage that was often incomplete during the scoring process, and built an unusual orchestral setup that included 16 cellos, an octobass and custom instruments. The composers also reflect on their fourth consecutive Emmy nomination, their work with Hans Zimmer, and the emotional experience of recording the season with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales shortly after losing their home in the Palisades fires.
‘Prehistoric Planet: Ice Age’ takes viewers millions of years beyond the extinction of the dinosaurs and into the Pleistocene era, where dramatic cycles of freezing and warming shaped the planet and the creatures that inhabited it. The five-part docuseries brings the Ice Age to life through the latest scientific discoveries, exploring the iconic megafauna of the period—from woolly mammoths and saber-toothed cats to giant bears and other remarkable species—as they adapted to shifting landscapes, extreme climates, and the constant struggle for survival. Combining current science with cinematic visuals, the series offers a look at a prehistoric world populated by animals whose complex behaviors often have striking parallels to species alive today.
Executive produced by Jon Favreau and Mike Gunton, ‘Prehistoric Planet: Ice Age’ is narrated by Tom Hiddleston. The series is produced by the team at BBC Studios Natural History Unit with support from the photorealistic visual effects of Framestore.
All episodes of ‘Prehistoric Planet: Ice Age’ are streaming on Apple TV.
Awards Focus: How honored are you to be nominated for your work on the first episode of ‘Prehistoric Planet: Ice Age?’
Kara Talve: Very much so. It’s always a surprise to us whenever anyone cares about anything we’re doing. So to be completely honest, it’s always a shock, but we’re very grateful and it’s amazing to be nominated with people we’ve looked up to for forever.
Anže Rozman: If I may chip in, this is our fourth year in a row to be nominated. Three of those nominations we’ve shared. The first time we were nominated, it was for ‘Prehistoric Planet’ Season 2. You’re obviously happy, but in the back of your mind, there’s always that voice saying, ah, it was like you were just lucky, blah, blah, blah. And the second year, the third year, now the fourth year, it means the most to me so far because I think, oh, we actually probably are doing a good job if for four years in a row we’ve been nominated. It makes me feel warm and fuzzy, like how Kara said, that people care and they see the effort that we put into the music because we really do care about all the shows that we work on.
AF: Between ‘Prehistoric Planet’ and ‘The Americas,’ what is it that appeals to you about scoring a nature documentary series?
Kara Talve: I think for both of us, we always wanted to do nature docs. It’s like a composer’s dream. You just really have a lot of space to write big, epic, sweeping music. Whereas sometimes in scripted shows, you kind of have to dial yourself back a bit and let the narration do a lot of the talking, but this gives us—well, there’s still narration, but there are moments where we can really sing, and that’s super fun for any composer.
AF: Were there any particular notes that you received from the showrunners as far as what kind of music was wanted for the season?
Anže Rozman: Well, for season one and two, which focused around dinosaurs 65 million years ago, that’s about 65 million years before humankind, I mean, Homo sapiens existed. We are so far detached from that period that the brief for season one and two was otherworldly. The shift for season three, which is Ice Age animals and the Pleistocene era, it’s animals that coexisted with humankind so it’s not that otherworldly anymore. We connect with mammoths because we know how elephants look and Homotherium are just a different kind of big cat. The score is a lot more emotional in that sense because we still somehow feel the presence of these animals now. If it weren’t for Homo sapiens, these animals would probably still be roaming around the world. Even though the score is more emotional, there’s still otherworldly aspects of it. You still want to have a sense that these animals are gone and that the world back then was much different.
AF: With the past season focusing on the ice age, what were you looking to do different with the musical direction of the show?
Kara Talve: Well, some of the showrunners’ direction was: we really need to feel the weight and the scale of these animals. We did that by having a very specific orchestral lineup, which Anže is very good at explaining. All I remember is that there were 16 cellos.
Anže Rozman: Well, we got inspired by the mammoths, how they heard together to protect their young. They create this circle. So we did an orchestra which we positioned the orchestra symmetrically. You have 16 cellos in a semicircle. You have the double basses at the back, violins left, right, and violas in the center. And then we had six horns on one side, and on the other side, we had 4 euphoniums and trombones and tubas, all nicely positioned in a semicircle.
We also recorded an octo bass, which is a bass so big that you have to play it on a stool. It goes down to 16 hertz.
Kara Talve: We also made a custom instrument specifically for the Ice Age season, which is a sort of wind instrument that’s inspired by the terror birds. We could send you a picture or a video if that’s helpful. It’s hard to describe.
Anže Rozman: Yeah, our other custom instruments for season one and two are on that wall. You see the Triceratops-looking one. But that one is too big, so it needs to be in another room. The Terror Tone, as we call it.
Kara Talve: It has its own room.
AF: At what point in the process do you start composing—before or after seeing footage?
Kara Talve: Most of the time, we’ll start with some themes before we see the footage. We know the story and kind of what the production is going for, and we’ll all sit together with Hans and Russell and brainstorm what we want the theme to be and how we will lace it through the score. The theme usually comes first and then we’ll start scoring once we have any rough animation. Because the VFX process for a show like this is very long, we have to start pretty early to make sure we make that deadline.
AF: When you do get footage, does it generally come with a temp score?
Anže Rozman: Yeah, there’s always a temp score. It’s a good thing when you do a couple of seasons of stuff because the temp score is usually something from the previous seasons. But temp score is always very helpful because especially with the spotting sessions that you have with the producers and the directors, it’s a good guide of the emotional arc, story arc of each scene. And here, we had to have a lot of imagination sometimes because sometimes there wouldn’t be any animal on the screen yet because they only had footage from—all the nature scenes are not CGI, only the animals are. Sometimes, the animals would be missing or it would be a puppet or a cardboard cutout and you would have to imagine the story. The spotting sessions and temp music always help us as a guide with that.
AF: With three composers working on the series, how do you balance up the composing duties?
Kara Talve: I think we like to play on our strengths. I mean, Anže and I are married, so we’re pretty good at delegating work to one another, and we just decide who we think would do the best job on each sequence. A lot of times, we collaborate on one sequence. There’s a bunch of sequences that are just two minutes of one of us, and then it switches off to the next composer, and you would never know because we just figured out how to dial in that sound. Or hopefully you wouldn’t know.
AF: Was there a cue in particular that evolved the most from start to finish?
Anže Rozman: I think because it was the third season, we were well oiled machine and the team at Apple and BBC—it was so planned so much more in advance that we were quite lucky that a lot of the music that we did early on stayed. If you look back at season one, the story was a lot different because we were all trying to find the perfect sound, the perfect shape of things, how the story arcs evolve, how it differs from the documentary music of other natural history shows. So in this sense, season three was very, very smooth. Yeah, would you agree?
Kara Talve: Yeah.
AF: Similarly, was there a cue that was particularly challenging to crack?
Kara Talve: I feel like every cue, when you start with a blank screen, it always feels really challenging to crack. Natural history is really, really hard to do, especially Ice Age, it has the emotional shifts of animation in the way that you don’t have a lot of time to say one thing before you move on to the next story point. It’s challenging to do that, but also keep it interesting and stay in this palette that’s not supposed to be cartoon-like. That’s the part I find most challenging in a show like this.
Anže Rozman: Yeah, I would agree.
AF: Is there a studio that you like to record at because of the way it sounds?
Kara Talve: Yeah, we love many studios.
Anže Rozman: For ‘Prehistoric Planet,’ all three seasons were recorded with the BBC Orchestra of Wales, and they’re just phenomenal.
Kara Talve: Yeah, they are really an amazing group.
Anže Rozman: And this season, the recording session was extra emotional because it happened one week after the Palisades fires where we lost our house. We were living out of a hotel room and that recording session was so emotional for us because it was almost healing. We felt at home listening to them play and they are so nice and so musical. I have very fond memories of it.
Kara Talve: Yeah, and Ben Foster conducted it.
Anže Rozman: Oh, he’s amazing.
Kara Talve: He’s the best.
AF: Sorry to hear about the fires. I know a number of friends who were impacted.
Kara Talve: Thank you. Yeah, I’m sure.
AF: What’s it been like working with Hans Zimmer?
Anže Rozman: Well, this is Kara’s sixth show with Hans, my fifth, I think. We’ve worked with him on and off for several years now so it’s we’re a pretty well oiled machine. But of course, we learn from him all the time. I mean, he is an amazing composer and an amazing mind, and we’re very privileged to be able to work alongside him.
Kara Talve: Yeah, and he’s a very gracious mentor. I always feel really lucky when we get to sit in a room together. The very surreal experience.
AF: It was so nice getting to chat with you this afternoon.
Kara Talve: You as well.
Anže Rozman: Likewise, Danielle.
Kara Talve: Thank you for having us.