Academy Award-winning composer James Horner, who scored films ranging from "Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan" to "Field of Dreams" to "Titanic," died Monday when the small plane he was piloting crashed near Santa Barbara, California. He was 61.

A concert hall composer who wrote scores for a handful of films in the late 1970s and early '80s, including the Roger Corman-produced "Battle Beyond the Stars," Horner broke into mainstream in 1982 with "Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan," and never seemed to look back.

Within a few years, he moved from relative obscurity to become one of the composers who defined the sound of Hollywood over the next two decades, with credits that include "48 Hrs.," "Cocoon," "Aliens," "An American Tail," "Field of Dreams," "Glory," "Braveheart" and, of course, "Titanic" and "Avatar." In more recent years, he'd worked on such films as "The Amazing Spider-Man" and the upcoming "Southpaw."

A 10-time Oscar nominee, Horner won two for "Titanic," for best original dramatic score and best original song for "My Heart Will Go On."