Prehistoric Planet Composers Build Custom Prehistoric Instruments

As the second season of Prehistoric Planet concluded earlier last week, fans have been raving. Since its grand debut last year, the documentary series has been heavily praised on all levels. From its groundbreaking visuals, to its unique take on popular dinosaur species, and even its sweeping musical score. But what if I told you that the dinosaurs depicted in the series had a more hands-on involvement than you’d imagine? Check out the video below.

Your eyes and ears are not fooling you, that is what is called a Hadro Cello. It is what happens when you take a ¼ cello and a moose femur bone. The Hadro Cello is one of many custom instruments made with real bones, fossils, or pieces of 200-million-year-old petrified wood! Another example of this cool ensemble is the Triceratone, which is an electric double bass made out of a replica of a triceratops skull. Note the turning pegs made out of velociraptor claws!

Other notable prehistoric instruments are…

• Petrified Wood Xylophone – A fusion between a scrap toy xylophone body with various slabs of petrified wood.
• Raptor Violin – A violin that utilized both a deer femur bone and a bull antler.
• Fat Rex – The combination of a frame drum, a cello fingerboard, and a custom 3D-printed T-Rex skull.

Who Is Behind The Music Of Prehistoric Planet?

Prehistoric Planet shares three official composers. The first is Academy Award Winner Hans Zimmer, best known for his work on The Lion King and Pirates of the Caribbean. Next is Anže Rozman, who has scored other documentary shows such as The Planets, Nova, and Nature. Finally, there is Kara Talve, who has been working on The Simpsons (principal composer, supervising composer, and technical score engineer) since 2018. The trio won the award for Original Song/Score at the 2022 Hollywood Music in Media Awards for Prehistoric Planet season one!

How Prehistoric Planet Uses Music To Bring Extinct Species To Life

Upon its premiere, Prehistoric Planet was praised by critics and audiences alike for its unique, and up-to-date representation of the extinct creatures we all know and love. Gone are the days when the T-Rex is presented as a lean, mean, fighting machine; and instead is presented as a more peaceful parent, or a scarred elder. The large, intimidating mosasaur can be seen relaxing at the bottom of a reef and allowing fish to pick away at its molting skin and filthy teeth. Season one even shows a carnotaurus doing a cheerful dancing ritual to entice a female. The music plays a large part of immersing the audience, and producer Tim Walker was no stranger to its importance when he sat down with Gizmodo to talk about its development.

Anže and Kara were involved along with Hans right from early doors when, when we were planning the series. We’ve worked with Hans and the team before, and the requirement for a cinematic score is once again part and parcel for this type of filmmaking. It brings such an emotional drive to the series and the ambition with the music was to create a suite of symphonies that represented the different habitats that we showcase in each episode, but with the overlying theme of Prehistoric Planet.

Both seasons of Prehistoric Planet are available to stream on AppleTV+.