Joe Kraemer (composer)

Joe Kraemer (born 1971) is an American composer. His film scores include The Way of the Gun (2000), Joy Ride 2: Dead Ahead (2008), and Jack Reacher (2012), as well as Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015).

Kraemer was born in Buffalo, New York and raised in Albany, New York. His father and uncle were both musicians, and Kraemer began taking piano lessons at an early age. In high school he befriended an older boy named Scott Storm, who became a professional filmmaker. Kraemer's first film score was for a Super-8 film written and directed by Storm, called Chiming Hour. Kraemer, who also acted in the film, was 15 at the time. Storm later introduced Kraemer to filmmakers Bryan Singer and Christopher McQuarrie.

While attending Berklee School of Music in Boston, Kraemer decided he wanted to be a film composer. Through contacts such as Singer and McQuarrie, he was able to obtain work first as a sound (and occasionally music) editor, before eventually crossing over into television and film composing.

Kraemer's first feature film score was the 2000 film The Way of the Gun, a modern-day western written and directed by Oscar-winner Christopher McQuarrie. The film starred Benicio del Toro, Ryan Phillippe, and James Caan. Though the film performed poorly at the box office, it became something of a cult classic, and some industry insiders began to expect great things from Kraemer.

Over the next few years, Kraemer scored music for the hit Cinemax series, Femme Fatales, the docudrama Emerald Cowboy (2003); in 2006 he teamed up with his old classmate Scott Storm for the low-budget crime thriller Ten 'til Noon, which won awards at the film festival level; and in 2008 he scored the direct-to-video thriller Joy Ride 2: Dead Ahead, written by J. J. Abrams.

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