Ave Satani

"Ave Satani" is the theme song to the film The Omen (1976) composed by Jerry Goldsmith.The Omen won the Academy Award for Best Original Score, with Ave Satani nominated for Best Original Song, one of the few foreign language (Latin) songs ever to be nominated.

The Latin title of Ave Satani translates to "Hail Satan" in English. In an interview, Goldsmith says that his idea was to create a kind of Satanic version of a Gregorian chant and came up with ideas while talking with the London choir-master of the orchestra that was helping him. He decided to create something like a Black Mass, inverting Latin phrases from the Latin Mass. The choir-master, according to Goldsmith, was an expert in Latin and helped him come up with phrases; instead of saying "Hail Mary", they decided on "Hail Satan", and so on. The song contains various Latin phrases inverting Christ and the Mass, such as "Ave Versus Christi", meaning "Hail Anti-Christ", and "Corpus Satani", an inversion of "Corpus Christi", the body of Christ. The resulting lyrics are an inversion of the Roman Catholic rite of the consecration and elevation of the body and blood of Christ during the Mass (see Eucharist in the Catholic Church).