''Lux Æterna'' (, ; "eternal light") is an orchestral composition by Clint Mansell. Performed by the

Kronos Quartet The Kronos Quartet is an American string quartet based in San Francisco. It has been in existence with a rotating membership of musicians for almost 50 years. The quartet covers a very broad range of musical genres, including contemporary classic ...

, it forms a leitmotif in the 2000 film ''

Requiem for a Dream ''Requiem for a Dream'' is a 2000 American psychological drama film directed by Darren Aronofsky and starring Ellen Burstyn, Jared Leto, Jennifer Connelly, Christopher McDonald and Marlon Wayans. It is based on the 1978 novel of the same na ...

'', and is the

penult Penult is a linguistics term for the second to last syllable of a word. It is an abbreviation of ''penultimate'', which describes the next-to-last item in a series. The penult follows the antepenult and precedes the ultima. For example, the main ...

imate piece in the movie's soundtrack. A re-orchestrated version of the composition, titled "Requiem for a Tower", was created for the trailer of '' The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers'' in 2002.

In popular culture

Both "Lux Aeterna" and the re-orchestrated version, "Requiem for a Tower" that was created for the trailer of '' The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers'', have been used in multiple forms of media, including the film trailers for ''

The Da Vinci Code ''The Da Vinci Code'' is a 2003 mystery thriller novel by Dan Brown. It is Brown's second novel to include the character Robert Langdon: the first was his 2000 novel ''Angels & Demons''. ''The Da Vinci Code'' follows symbologist Robert Lang ...

'', '' I Am Legend'', '' Sunshine'' and '' Babylon A.D.''; trailers for the video games '' Assassin's Creed'' and '' Lord of the Rings: Return of the King''; advertising campaigns for such products as

Canon PowerShot The PowerShot products is a line of consumer and prosumer grade digital cameras, launched by Canon in 1996. () In 1996 a model of PowerShot was introduced to the market, The Powershot 600. The production of The PowerShort came shortly after Can ...

cameras,

Molson Canadian Molson Canadian is a brand of 5% abv lager beer (4% in Ireland) brewed by Molson Brewing, the Canadian division of Molson Coors Brewing Company. The beer was introduced in 1959. Awards Molson Canadian has won several beer industry awards, inclu ...

and Canadian wireless carrier

Telus Telus Communications Inc. (TCI) is the wholly owned principal subsidiary of Telus Corporation, a Telecommunications in Canada, Canadian national telecommunications company that provides a wide range of telecommunications products and services ...

; and on television such as in the series ''

So You Think You Can Dance ''So You Think You Can Dance'' is a franchise of reality television shows in which contestants compete in dance. The first series of the franchise, created by '' Idols'' producers Simon Fuller and Nigel Lythgoe, premiered in July 2005 and ha ...

'' as well as a promo spot the series ''

Flash Forward A flashforward (also spelled flash-forward, and more formally known as prolepsis) is a scene that temporarily takes the narrative forward in time from the current point of the story in literature, film, television and other media. Flashforwards a ...

''.

Requiem for a Tower

A re-orchestrated version of "Lux Aeterna", titled "Requiem for a Tower", was arranged by composers Simone Benyacar, Dan Nielsen and Veigar Margeirsson for the trailer of '' The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers''. "Requiem for a Tower" features a

choir A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which sp ...

and full

orchestra An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * bowed string instruments, such as the violin, viola, c ...

. Although never intended for release, after considerable demand by fans the re-recording(s) were made available as part of the ''Requiem for a Tower'' album release from Corner Stone Cues. While the release was originally made physically, production was discontinued indefinitely with increased digital sales of the album on major electronic music distributors iTunes and

Amazon MP3 Amazon Music (previously Amazon MP3) is a music streaming platform and online music store operated by Amazon. Launched in public beta on September 25, 2007, in January 2008 it became the first music store to sell music without digital rights m ...

Corner Stone Cues release

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lux Aeterna Songs written for films 2000 songs Compositions by Clint Mansell Requiem for a Dream