The sands of Arrakis are singing again. Ahead of the December 18 release of Dune: Part Three (opening the same day in the US and Japan), "Desert Chant," the first single from Hans Zimmer's soundtrack, arrived on all major digital platforms on October 20 (local time) via WaterTower Music. It is credited jointly to Hans Zimmer and Timothée Chalamet, who plays Paul Atreides. The track opens quietly with Chalamet humming before swelling into an epic war chant.

A Soundtrack That Begins With the Lead Actor's Voice

The first surprise is the design itself: the first single from the final chapter opens not with an orchestral roar or a massive synth drone, but with the lead actor humming. Chalamet has sung on screen before, in Wonka and in the Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, where he performed the songs and guitar himself. But what this track asks of him is less vocal prowess than a voice that seems to leak out from inside Paul himself.

Part Three is based on Frank Herbert's Dune Messiah. Set 17 years after the previous film, Paul's rule as emperor has brought dark consequences, and his visions have grown clouded. In a world where a hero is deified and war spreads in his name, a single person's small hum gets swallowed by a crowd's war chant. The fun of "Desert Chant" is that its structure alone seems to preview the themes of Dune Messiah.

Dune's Music Has Always Been Made of Voices

Zimmer's Dune was a "music of voices" from the start. In the 2021 first film, vocals by Loire Cotler and others formed the core of a desert soundscape unlike conventional orchestral film music, earning Zimmer his second Academy Award for Best Original Score. For Part Two, he developed those themes so extensively that the score was ruled ineligible for the Oscar under the Academy's rules on the proportion of pre-existing music. In other words, Dune's music is built as a continuous trilogy, nurturing the same material from film to film.

Heard in that light, it is symbolic that "Desert Chant" uses the lead actor's voice as its material. Fremen prayers, the Bene Gesserit Voice, and now the voice of the man who has become a messiah himself. In a series about a world where voices hold power, placing Paul's own hum at the entrance to the final chapter can hardly be a coincidence.

"Two Teenagers Moved by the Same Novel"

Zimmer describes the track as a return to the novel that first sparked his imagination as a teenager, the same book that later connected him with director Denis Villeneuve. His line that when two teenagers are moved by the same novel, they "will inevitably meet and become creative brothers" is one that will resonate with fans as the trilogy nears its end. He adds that "the beauty of working on 'Dune' was that it would take me back into a time of being full of youthful imagination."

Here are the key points.

  • Release: "Desert Chant" is the first single from Dune: Part Three (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack), on WaterTower Music
  • The film: Directed by Denis Villeneuve, written by Villeneuve and Brian K. Vaughan. In theaters and IMAX on December 18 (same day in Japan)
  • Zimmer's winter: He is also scoring HBO's Harry Potter series, premiering December 25, and his "Hans Zimmer Live" tour is currently in Asia and Australia

What to Expect From the Final Score

The full album's release date and tracklist have not yet been announced, but leading with this track makes the direction fairly clear. The desert soundscape built through Part Two will likely turn this time toward the cost, rather than the glory, of the messiah. The few minutes it takes for a hum to become a war chant seem to condense the trilogy's endpoint, which makes the two months until release feel very long. Start with the stream, turn your headphones up a little, and listen from the breath of that very first hum.