"Prologue" - Harry Potter (Score Analysis & Reduction)
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 16 окт 2024
- SUPPORT THIS CHANNEL & BECOME A MEMBER TODAY
► Access to exclusive, members-only analysis videos
► Access to downloadable analysis PDFs
► Early access to new videos
► Photos and status updates of videos I’m currently working on
► Loyalty badges next to your name in the comments
Become a member by clicking the “JOIN” button above, or by following this link: / @bradfrey
TWITCH: twitch.tv/bradfrey
INSTAGRAM: @therealbradfrey
FACEBOOK: filmscoreanalysis
EMAIL: officialbradfreymusic@gmail.com
#HarryPotter #FilmScoreAnalysis
For the four of you who might still be interested in dissecting those RIDICULOUS chords at 1:09, some of my coworkers offered up another theory for them: that John Williams simply had a cat walk across his piano, and notated the result. Until someone can offer a better explanation, this theory is officially canon for me.
If you like monstrous mystery chords and mischievous musical felines, then consider becoming a member by clicking “JOIN” above. Memberships help support the channel, and grant you access to downloadable analysis PDFs, exclusive members-only analysis videos, and a complimentary ride on Hagrid’s flying motorcycle. 🐈
That would actually make a lot of sense considering this part plays during McGonagall’s transformation from cat to human
Always loved that sound ! Even if it's true, the orchestration is so well-made than he could do that everytime he want !
I've wasted far too much of my night trying to figure out this passage... so for now, yes, I'm guessing he planned on writing an ascending series of chords and decided the specific notes by experimenting at the piano--so in a way, random. If you want to go down the rabbit hole I found, look into the interval content and how he distributes these intervals from top to bottom.
Those are fun! On the face of it, I'd say that they're polychords, but with some "chords" being made up of quartal sonorities stacked in interesting ways. For instance, the fifth chord looks like Bb/Eb+Db/Gb+A/D (quartals) with an Ebm7 on top…and if you look at each voice moving linearly, it works quite nicely (not quite planing, but very linear like you might find in saxophone soli writing in some big band charts).
And now I read your treatise on the page! I think you're right that he wanted it to feel random, so the relationship to the polychords isn't 1-to-1 for each chord, but he's also creating multiple polychords within each sonority (3 or even 4), which is a nice way of being chromatic without being cloying.
The more I listen to the Harry potter scores by John Williams and the more you break them down the more I appreciate William's genius. Thank so much for that.
You’re welcome
I can never get bored of his HP scores. I've been listening to them since they came out and they always feel so fresh.
@Greg Elchert 100% Williams set the bar so high, it was inevitable they would not be able to reach it.
This reduction blew my mind, because I've always felt the pulse differently in the first 8 bar! I feel the downbeat on the C (second celesta note), and I can't feel it the other way even if I try
Same. I think it’s because the low strings start just slightly before the downbeat in the recording.
Same!!!! I think the melody jumps up to C from G, so it occurs an accent naturally.
Syncing it all with the scene itself really does help you understand not only how the music is applied to the scene, but also to what lengths masters like John Williams can help fit such wonderful music into such a small amount of time - and in such an important expository scene. The more you listen and watch, the more intellectually stimulating Williams becomes, while still being just as enjoyable to listen to for entertainment.
I'm glad that you recognize this in film music, and help us all of us understand more and more the importance of music in film. Thank you!
first, I'm your huge fan~ I just did some work on that 31-35 measures chords.
31, 1 Eb maj7 + D maj7 extracted form G double harmonic minor (female melody ''Db'. J.W hided that note in 'D maj7' )
31. 2 B major + Am from E harmonic minor (f.m 'Eb' in 'Eb maj7)
32. 1 C major + Bbm from F harmonic minor (f.m 'E' in 'C major)
32. 2 B7 + Cm from E harmonic minor (f.m 'F#' in 'B7')
33. 1 Ebm + D maj7 from G double harmonic minor (f.m 'A' in 'D maj7)
33. 2 Dm + Ab major from D Dominant Diminish (f.m 'Ab' in 'Ab major')
34. 1 Em7 + F#m from D Ionian (f.m 'A in 'F#m')
34. 2 C7 + F#m6 from C Dominant Dim (f.m 'C' in 'C7')
35. 1 Ab maj7 + F#m from Db double harmonic minor (f.m 'Eb' in 'Ab maj7')
(in this case F# added to Db D H minor scale usually omitted. so that makes 3 serial half step intervals F#-G, G-Ab, Ab-A)
all mixed polychords are not exact order I noted. just mixed them up with proper intervals, skips, inversions and instrumentation!
the core of this marvel is female choir.
the melodies(Db, Eb, E, F#, A, Ab, A, C, E) they sing are all from Db harmonic minor
and all nine poly chords flow to express notes from Db harmonic minor with other than Db harmonic minor scale except last chord(this time Db DH minor mode. what a finish!!)
these wonderful series are completely under Mr Williams' control. there's no exception!!
Salute John Williams and Brad Frey......
I can't thank you enough Man!!!
I hope this will help a little!
Now this is an INCREDIBLE analysis. John William's scores for Harry Potter are some of his best works I think.
Thank you so much! This might be my favourite cue from the 1st movie. Can't wait for the Diagon Alley cue :-)
You’re welcome
I want to thank you so much for taking your time and effort and also talent on doing this. Thank You bro
Thank you for this analysis!
You’re welcome
Where can I find the complete sheet music?
Its nut how RHYTHMIC a scene can be with the right music underneath
This is brilliant, thank you. I'm learning so much. I think Hedwig's theme signifying magical occurrences is fitting. Hedwig is Harry's link to magic and the wizarding world when he's with the Dursleys. Therefore she represents the magical world in a way? That's the way it's always made thematic sense to me.
Thank you so much for the work you put into this channel. I follow you with great pleasure!
You’re welcome
OMG!!This is totally incredible!!!LOVE IT!!!
I believe that the chords used in the cat passage would be coming from oliver messiaen's limited transposition modes, the seventh mode sounds similar
Where did you get these scores from? Really want to see the full thing for orchestration stuff.
Guau, this score is incredible. Thanks Williams and thank you for sharing!!
I love your videos and HP music gains even more magic thanks to you. But wouldnt it be more accurate to look at this #4 and b6 as a intervals, that give specific sound to lydian and aeolian modes?
Someone knows where can I buy this sheet music?
Exceptional work.
where did you get score to this?
Where I can get the score?
Extraordinary analysis !!!!
Great work! Do you do this by ear or you have scores?
i actually love you for this
I'm curious... why is "cor anglais" written in French?
Also who would be the composer (for film scores, I mean) with the most complex music? I find William's scores to be more complicated that other soundtracks I listen to, Zimmer, Silvestri, Howard Shore...
because john Williams is a classic music composer
@@hhhkill5747 but isn't that a bit ironic for an instrument that is litterally called "english horn"?
@@amaurythewarrior I think it depends on personal habits I prefer to call“English horn”
That is just magnificent!! Thank you!!!❤️
You’re welcome
Thank you so much for making this video (as well as all the other great analyses on your channel)! :)
I’ve wanted to get a peek at the score for this particular scene for many years, especially because of the intriguing chord progression at 1:09 that is virtually impossible to transcribe by ear with reasonable accuracy, so I’m happy I can now check which notes I’ve been missing.
Analyzing such passages is obviously quite a challenging undertaking, as they are, for all intents and purposes, not tonal (I think I’d call them neotonal or perhaps atonal) and hence tend to elude formal analysis using a theory of traditional functional (tertian) harmony; so if I may, I’d like to suggest you take a more voicing- and voice-leading-based approach here, i.e., paying closer attention to the interval relationships between the various pairs of vertically/horizontally adjacent notes in/between the individual voicings (chords):
In essence, what makes this progression work (so well) is (IMHO) …
1. … the consistent use of “stable”, close-position triads, seventh chords, or quartal “subvoicings” on the top and/or bottom of each voicing (so yes, the concept of polychords can be successfully applied to some extent),
2. … the consistently stepwise(-ish) motion in the main voice (= women’s voices, by virtue of balance + instrumentation), i.e, there are no leaps spanning ≥4 semitones,
3. … a great deal of parallel motion between the various treble voices (orchestra bells through violas),
4. … and finally the contrary motion between the treble and bass voices.
I think it’s important to understand that this progression is by no means “random”, i.e., change a number of notes so that the above points no longer hold and I guarantee you it will no longer work!
However, that’s not to say that JW must have come up with some elaborate novel chord-progression construction scheme; rather, like a handful of other truly brilliant musicians living today, he has a very advanced, intimate, profoundly intuitive (as opposed to strictly theory-based) understanding of harmony and harmonic balance (tension vs. release, consonance vs. dissonance) and, for the most part, probably “discovered” these voicings through "inspired" guesswork/improvisation on his piano.
Jacob Collier is another good example of a harmonic genius who, led mainly by his intuition (even though he does have a profound understanding of music theory), comes up with seemingly “impossible” (sometimes even microtonal) or “random” chord progressions consisting of “illegal” voicings that “shouldn’t” work according to traditional theory, but actually do so because he has mastered voice leading (that's also precisely how he himself explains it), intuitively applying the strategy outlined above.
As for why this progression not only works, but also sounds distinctly mysterious/magical, you already mentioned the key ingredients yourself: fundamental to each of these chords are dim7 or 7♭5 (7♯11) voicings (and the C half-whole diminished scale harp glissando tuning, which is basically just Cdim7 + D♭dim7 or C7♭5 + E♭7♭5), which are the only two ways of combining two distinct tritones within one octave if we’re avoiding those overly dissonant minor seconds (note that [C D G♭ A♭] and [C E F♯ B♭] are both 7♭5 voicings, just in different inversions).
So once again it all boils down to the TRITONE, the mystic interval. :)
Lastly, a detailed analysis along these lines could start out like this:
1st voicing = C7♭5 + A7♭5 (i.e., C half-whole diminished scale), but with C and E omitted to decrease dissonance and allow for a stable perfect fourth on the bottom side ([C♯ F♯] rather than [C F♯]), plus an added “chromatic rub” D in the middle of the voicing; also note the E♭ triad on top.
1st to 2nd voicing: parallel motion between topmost and bottom two voices (+m3) as well as between all remaining (treble) voices (+M2).
2nd voicing = based on Cdim7, diminished triad on top.
2nd to 3rd voicing: trivial parallel motion between all treble voices (+m2); countered by contrary motion between treble and bass (−m2) voices.
3rd voicing: see 2nd voicing.
3rd to 4th voicing: parallel motion between bottom three voices (+M2).
4th voicing = Cdim7 + G (bottom; for voice-leading reasons) + B (top; it seems like B♭ would, in principle, also have been a valid choice, but assuming that JW wanted to reach E♭ again for the fifth chord, B makes more sense because of the resulting smoother, stepwise-ish m3 + m3 motion).
etc.
Could you please send me those PDFs? I cannot see that tiny little notes! Its cool thx.
Ook! [That dissertation is 750 pages long ffs..... Mine was only 180....]
It'd be delightful to go for "The ultimate war (long version)" from Hook someday !
I was listening to M. Ippolitov-Ivanov's Songs of Ossian the other day, and I noticed that there is an interesting similarity between the B section of the second movement, Kolyma's Lament (ruclips.net/video/RNMVUIvDTEs/видео.html ), and a section in this cue where Dumbledore is carrying baby Harry to Dursleys' doorstep. Notice the similarities in key (e minor), orchestration (harp, violin thrills, violoncello pizz., oboe playing the theme), and even some in themes themselves.
Could you please do a analysis video on Howard Shore’s score on Hugo? the music there is incredible
thank you very very much!
1:20 what does the matrix mean?
3:42 always gives me Swan Lake vibes
John Williams Isolated Score Prologues
Why does it skip to the next page at 2:02?
cuz the final part of hedwig theme is replayed in the OST
but it is played once in the film
Amazing
Look, I just need to know who tf played Celeste for this score. That player was going HAM for the entire score... decuplets with chords, all the runs up and down... ALL WHILE sight reading 😓
It's a pity that john williams doesn't write his orchestration. So I think it should be interesting to see the difference, even if I think John give his opinion about them.
He does do his Orchestration. I hope you know this by now. But just in case, here i am 4 years later.
@@jessemoog5310 yes I know by now. Thank you!
👍
👍👍👍
1:06 seriously no one can read all that. there has to be a better way-- how about score reduction downloads? Why do it at all if all your ideas/thought of analysis are moot or someone's screen grab?
The reductions are already available as PDF downloads for people supporting the channel via RUclips memberships (details are in the video description). Otherwise, I don't mind if people screen grab or pause the video, which I imagine is what most people do.