The principal ingredient for listing is a composition that has been written specifically for an Australian feature film, television or short subject presentation, and has had a commercial release, primarily on vinyl, audio cassette or compact disc.

More simply... "if the film, television or short did not exist...the recording would not exist".

Common examples are seen as the "Original Motion Picture Score", "Original Feature Film Soundtrack", or "Original Television Soundtrack".

But soundtracks can consist of much more than the initial music score. They can be an eclectic mix of the original music, a compilation of prerecorded songs, or even dialogue lifted directly from a production. An obvious recent example being "The Adventures of priscilla, Queen of the Desert". The first compact disc (CD) release in 1994 contains 19 tracks, the majority of which were written in the 1970s and 1980s. One song, "I Don't Care if the Sun Don't Shine", was originally written by Mack David back in 1950. The second CD release "The priscilla Companion" combines actual dialogue from the film as well as the original music score composed by Guy Gross.

Also included within these pages are details of part recordings... releases that may only contain one related track, whether performed by the original artiste, or an adaption of an original theme by a non-original performer. These all form an additional part of the Australian soundtrack history.

Other entries (notably in the Television section), cover a wider spectrum, but again their origins all derive from specific productions. These include such releases as the numerous story and song audio cassettes and CDs from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation childrens' program "Play School". put simply, none would exist if Play School was not on television. Several issues are in fact taken directly from the original television soundtracks, while others are adaptions utilising the Play School identity.

As a matter of thoroughness, several foreign soundtrack releases have also been catalogued. Being a by-product of overseas production companies who have adopted the talents of foreign composers has not necessarily denied such a soundtrack a place amongst the local releases. Due to the very nature of their specific Australian-related content the following productions have been included.