Playing silent films almost always requires live music. On December 28, 1895, at the premiere of Lumiere's film in Paris, there was the first live pianist. From the beginning, people have always believed that music is indispensable and is very important to the atmosphere or to cultivate the audience's emotions; many theaters in small towns or residential areas have pianists. Beginning in the 1910s, many large cities began to have wind musicians or entire orchestras. A large number of dramatic wind instruments and tuners can effectively stimulate the audience's emotions.

Music scores for silent films were mostly improvised. But when showing feature films became commonplace, silent film music, performed by luthiers, orchestrators, conductors, and the theaters themselves, came together. In 1915, when Griffith made his landmark production "The Birth of a Nation", almost all the music was written by J.C. Beale; since then, more and more original and specially written scores for the film have been produced. It’s become common.

At the height of silent films, film production was the industry that employed the largest number of musicians (at least in the United States). The advent of talkies, coupled with the Great Recession, severely damaged their livelihoods.

The film industry in many countries is trying to use other methods to bring sound into movies. In Brazil, early films featured acapella performances, mini-operas, or singers in the background singing along with lip syncs. In Japan, in addition to live sound effects, movies also have benshi (Benshi) who provide on-site dubbing and commentary for the movie. Benshi became an important element of Japanese cinema, and they also provided translations for foreign (mostly American) films. Their popularity was one of the reasons why silent films were still popular in Japan into the 1930s. Composers like Carl Davis specialized in orchestral scores for silent films.