As the number 2 film composer of all time, what makes John Williams so great?
One word: EMOTION.
His music is filled with emotion, and this is an exploration into why his music carries so much feeling.
In Part 1, we looked at how he Mickey Mouses emotion by carefully timing the emotional content of the music with the film.
And in Part 2, we saw how he uses leitmotifs to reveal characters’ emotions and how his emotional content is character driven. His isn’t trying to make the audience feel emotion but instead shows how the characters are thinking and feeling.
But this still leaves us with one last question:
How does his musical content elicit emotion?
We looked at how he enhances emotion through leitmotifs and Mickey Mousing emotion, but neither technique inherently gives emotion to a cue.
So that’s what we are going to explore today. And we are going to start exploring someone completely different.
Michael Giacchino and “The Chord”
Michael Giacchino points out many of the ideas we’ve been going over so far.
- Character-driven
- Themes to match character (leitmotifs)
- Leitmotifs morphing to fit the emotion of a scene
But there’s one point he makes towards the beginning that is interesting and new.
When creating a score, Michael Giacchino looks for the one chord that captures the emotion of the film. For up, he says, is an F major 7th.
On the surface, that seems obvious.
Of course, each chord has a different emotion!
But that’s the point!
If each chord has an inherent emotion, then we should be able to direct John Williams’s harmony with different chords. And we should find some consistency in his harmonic language and the feeling he’s creating.
And as a matter of fact, we do!
So let’s go over a few of his harmonic contexts and match the emotion.
John William’s Harmonic Language
Major/Minor
Often called diatonic, he saves this for grand moments that need to sound familiar.
Fully Diminished 7ths
Coming from traditional romantic era harmony, he uses fully diminished 7ths quite often for romantic moments. Often, these are temporary moments of tension with a major chord on either side.
For Marion’s theme, it alternates between a major chord and a fully diminished 7th several times.
Double Harmonic Major
The double harmonic major scale is just a major scale with a flat 2 and flat 6 (don’t worry if you don’t know what that means).
He consistently uses this scale for any emotion that resembles outer space or aliens.
For instance, right after the opening crawl in the original Star Wars is a short passage in the piccolo using the double harmonic major scale.
Polychords
Polychords are when you play two chords at the same time.
He often uses poly chords when the feeling is mysterious or otherworldly. For instance, from Part 1, there’s a polychord section when Harry puts on the invisibility cloak.
Another one is from the end of Revenge of the Sith.
Tritone Triads
These are usually two major chords that are a tritone apart.
Typically, this harmonic structure creates a sense of awe and wonder. Because of their intervallic distance apart, they don’t sound like they are part of the same key. The effect is very enigmatic.
You can see this all the time in Close Encounters in the Third Kind (and ironically in the Jaws theme).
Lydian/Major 7ths
Speaking of wonder, his use of the Lydian scale often creates this feeling. That’s why it’s used at the start of E.T. and as the “Wonder” theme for that movie.
But more specifically, he often uses this as if you are striving for something. That’s why the start of Anakin’s Theme uses this harmony.
“American” Chord
This is a more esoteric chord, but it has the form of A/D (A major with a D in the bass).
This chord was popularized by Aaron Copland who is famous for creating the Americana genre and a style of music that sounds like the American countryside.
John Williams uses this when he wants you to feel the open expanse of nature.
Chromatic Around Scale Degree 5
When the director wants to arouse suspicion, you can bet that John Williams will do some chromatic dances around scale degree 5.
By this, I mean that the melody often centers around that note. Gilderoy Lockhart is a great example of this.
Modal Harmony
Anytime where the atmosphere is supposed to sound folksy, he uses modal harmony.
Dartmoor 1812 is also a great example of modal harmony.
Quartal Harmony
He will almost always use 4ths and 5ths in the brass to represent heroism.
In fact, I already did an entire analysis of the Main Theme to Star Wars to explain just this.
For those wondering why I was so concerned about Rogue One’s rendition not being based on 4ths, it’s because harmony as emotion is a fundamental aspect of John Williams’s style. After this article, I think you can start to see why.
Wrapping It All Up
And there are so many other harmonic systems he uses.
Though other composers use similar methods of using harmony to elicit an emotion, John Williams has a much larger harmonic vocabulary. This lets him choose precisely the right harmony to fit a scene. He uses tools that many composers already employ and uses them with so much more detail.
That is why his scores are so much more emotional than most other film scores.
What do you think about this? Do you agree? Disagree? Believe I’m overanalyzing? Find this interesting?
Let me know down in the comments below.