The Canadian composer Mychael Danna won the Golden Globe award for best original score Sunday for his work on the fantasy-adventure film "Life of Pi."

Danna is also up for two Oscar nominations for the film, which is based on the prize-winning novel by Yann Martel. He's also been nominated for a British Academy Film Award.

Danna spent a year working on the score for "Life of Pi," a notably long period for a film score. The movie, directed by Ang Lee, tells the story of a shipwrecked Indian boy adrift in the Pacific Ocean with a Bengal tiger. The score uses a wide range of non-Western instruments, including a sitar, Persian ney, bowed sarangi and a bansuri reed flute.

Lee and Danna previously worked together on the film "The Ice Storm" in 1997. Danna studied composition at the University of Toronto, where he won the Glenn Gould Composition Scholarship in 1985. His filmography includes "500 Days of Summer," "Little Miss Sunshine" and "Capote."

The below audio illustrates the film score's polyglot nature, ranging from full orchestra to Eastern ensemble textures.