King Richard (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) is the soundtrack to the 2021 film of the same name directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green and starred Will Smith. The film's original score composed by Kris Bowers, released on November 12, 2021, by WaterTower Music, with 18 tracks from the score and an original song "Be Alive" performed by Beyoncé. It was also released as a single on the same date. The song earned Beyoncé, her first Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song at the 94th edition of the ceremony held in March 2022, along with numerous accolades.
For the film's score, Bowers used a prepared piano which was critical to emphasize familial warmth as well as driving it as a percussive vehicle to understand the sport of tennis, as well as how Serena and Venus changed the game. He intended to limit the sound palette in a somewhat literal way with strings and having felt on them, and a prepared piano was used into the score. He used putty, nails, ping-pong balls, clothespins, coins and pieces of paper to enhance the percussive sounds. Even though it diluted the string vibration, the sound resonated with piercing, unique power, which he admitted "In the beginning of the tennis match [in the film], we strip everything down just to prepared piano, so that it feels incredibly tense. And I wanted to create this rhythmic drive, so that the ball hitting felt like it was part of the music and the hits were almost punctuating parts of the score."
The score was recorded during the COVID-19 pandemic, instead of supervising the scoring process at his home studio, Bowers instead preferred to record the picture to big screen, which intended to assemble a large orchestra at Eastwood Scoring Stage in Warner Bros. Studios. Bowers wanted to steer clear of the motifs and themes heard in sporting films, to make the score unique as the film was put together in certain rhythm of mind. Apart from Green's direction, the film's editor Pamela Martin edited the matches to feel what the arc of the game was, resulting the film to be felt innovative. Rhythmically, he wanted the score to feel unpredictable as the game, hence he used several ambient and percussive sounds to immerse the viewers in the climax scenes.
Richard's theme was the first of the cues Bowers scored for, which was a five-note theme. Explaining about the theme, Bowers said "I thought about a chord that could encompass both of those things. That incessant note starts on the first chord and itâÂÂs already a dissonance; itâÂÂs already a note that doesnâÂÂt really fit in that chord but still has a warmth to it." He also admitted that there is a melody in that theme which felt interesting to do variations for all of the themes, during the competition scenes, and serves as an inspiration for Venus' cue, which started soft and timid and later grows and swells with the big orchestral score accompanies it.
Filmtracks.com wrote "Bowers achieves his purpose for King Richard and shows significant promise, but the work doesn't convince emotionally and stops well short of standing alongside the more inspirational sports scores of history." Monica Castillo of TheWrap wrote "Composer Kris Bowersâ score is similarly rich and glowing, swelling the music just as Richard and the girls get their hard-won victories and touching moments." Chris Tilly of IGN wrote "Kris Bowersâ music pays homage to Jerry GoldsmithâÂÂs Rocky score".