[1] In 2003, he won the César Award for Best Film Music written for The Pianist,[2] for which he also received a BAFTA nomination.

Kilar spent most of his life from 1948 in the city of Katowice in Southern Poland,[5] married (from April 1966 to November 2007) to Barbara Pomianowska, a pianist.

In 1977 Kilar was one of the founding members of the Karol Szymanowski Society, based in the mountain town of Zakopane.

In 1991 Polish filmmaker Krzysztof Zanussi made a biographical film about the composer titled Wojciech Kilar.

His other English language features — Roman Polanski's trio Death and the Maiden (1994), The Ninth Gate (1999) and The Pianist (2002), and Jane Campion's The Portrait of a Lady (1996) — were typified by his trademark grinding basses and cellos, deeply romantic themes and minimalist chord progressions.

In addition to his film work, Kilar continued to write and publish purely classical works, which have included a horn sonata, a piece for a wind quintet, several pieces for chamber orchestra and choir, the acclaimed Baltic Canticles, the epic Exodus (famous as the trailer music from Schindler's List and the main theme of Terrence Malick's Knight of Cups), a Concerto for Piano and Orchestra dedicated to Peter Jablonski, and his major work, the September Symphony (2003).

During the summer of 2013, Kilar manifested signs of poor health, such as fainting and elevated blood pressure, but attributed those symptoms to his heart problems.

He was admitted to a hospital, where he was diagnosed with a brain tumor, though news of his illness was only publicly released after his death.

He underwent a successful surgery to remove the tumor, which caused no serious side–effects; Kilar was very optimistic and continued to work after the operation.

[11] Following the cremation of his body, Kilar's funeral was held on 4 January 2014 at the Cathedral of Christ the King in Katowice.

January 2001 saw the world premiere of his Missa pro pace (composed for a full symphony orchestra, mixed choir and a quartet of soloists) at the National Philharmonic in Warsaw.

[15] His 1984 composition Angelus was used in the motion picture City of Angels; Orawa, from 1988, found its use in the Santa Clara Vanguard's 2003 production, "Pathways".

For most of his life, Kilar's output was dominated by music for film with a small but steady stream of concert works.

[9] Kilar was quoted as saying that he believed he had discovered the philosopher's stone, and that "there was nothing more beautiful than the solitary sound or concord that lasted eternally, that this was the deepest wisdom, nothing like our tricks with sonata allegros, fugues, and harmonics."

This was followed by the Prix Louis Delluc, which Kilar was awarded in 1980 for the music to an animated film titled Le Roi et l'Oiseau / The King and the Mockingbird, (dir.

Perhaps his greatest success came with his score to Francis Ford Coppola's Dracula, for which Kilar shared the 1993 ASCAP Award from the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Producers in Los Angeles (along with 7 other people and 5 other movies),[18] and was also nominated for the Saturn Award for Best Music in a science fiction, fantasy, or horror film in San Francisco in 1993.

The Polish State Cinema Committee honored Kilar with a lifetime achievement award in 1991, while in 1976 he was decorated with the Cavaliers' Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta.

The baritone part was then performed by Andrzej Bachleda-Curuś, the Symphony Orchestra of the Kraków Philharmonic was conducted by Jerzy Katlewicz.

[19][23][24] During the 2007 election campaign for the National Assembly of the Republic of Poland, Wojciech Kilar made a number of statements of his support of the Law and Justice party.