2001: A Space Odyssey (film) had earlier chosen as temporary music for the film. North did not learn that his score had been abandoned until he saw the film's premiere. The initial MGM soundtrack album release contained none of the material from the altered and uncredited rendition of Ligeti's "Aventures", used a different recording of "Also sprach Zarathustra" (performed by the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Karl Böhm) from that heard in the film, and a longer excerpt of "Lux aeterna" than that in the film. In 1996, Turner Entertainment/Rhino Records released a new soundtrack on CD that included the material from "Aventures" and restored the
The Killing Fields (soundtrack) films before (see "The Exorcist" and "The Space Movie"), this was the first time he had written specifically for film, and so far the only time. Oldfield composed the album on a Fairlight CMI. Like many movies, the album is not a comprehensive record of all the Oldfield soundtrack music used in the film. Most notably, the music accompanying the darkroom sequence does not feature on the album. The single from the album, "Étude", is taken from the Francisco Tarrega piece "Recuerdos de la Alhambra". Oldfield's work on the score was partially instigated by Virgin boss Richard Branson when he