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Formula 1 faces the music by commissioning new theme

Not satisfied with creating a new logo for Formula 1 at the end of 2017, new owner Liberty are now setting the sport to music.

It was revealed on Friday that Hollywood composer Brian Tyler has been commissioned to create the new main theme. The music will be used as part of the newly-announced F1 TV OTT digital streaming service.

It's not yet known whether it will also be used by the television world feed of practice sessions, qualifying and races.

A spokesperson for the commercial rights holders said that the sport was exploring all avenues to refresh the look and feel of the show.

"Music is a key component of the emotion of sport," the spokesperson told Motorsport.com. "We are engaging with top international talent in order to develop a new signature tune for F1.

"We will make a formal announcement at the right time."

Commissioning the theme was described as a "process in development". However, the news was broken by the composer himself via social media site Twitter on Friday.

"What an honour to be chosen to compose the Formula 1 theme!" Tyler posted. "This is a life-long dream come true as I am a massive #Formula1 fan. Thank you F1!"

Tyler attended last year's United States Grand Prix in Austin. He has scored some of the biggest blockbuster films of the past decade, including Iron Man 3, Thor: The Dark World and Avengers: Age of Ultron.

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He's best known for providing music for The Expendables movies and several entries in The Fast and the Furious franchise, including the most recent.

Recent Tom Cruise flop The Mummy bears another of Tyler's soundtracks, as does heist caper Now You See Me and its sequel. Other entries in Tyler's cinematic CV include the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles outing and action movie xXx: Return of Xander Cage

In total, Tyler's films have grossed more than $12 billion worldwide. It put him in the top ten highest-grossing film composers of all time.

The Emmy-nominated composer also provides soundtracks for television shows including Hawaii Five-O, Sleepy Hollow and Scorpion. He additionally wrote the musical cue introducing ESPN’s NFL coverage.

But perhaps Tyler's most widely-heard music is the fanfare that accompanies the Universal logo on all of that studio's films. He wrote in in 2012 to mark Universal's 100th anniversary. It replaced the former arrangement created by Jerry Goldsmith in 1997.

With that sort of pedigree, Tyler's services certainly won't come cheap - no matter how much of a fan he is. Teams who have just been told of a $47 million drop in the sport's revenues might understandably bristle at the outlay...

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.