Fun Random Facts About the LOTR Soundtrack
Most composers spend just 10-12ish weeks working on a filmās music. John Williams spent around 14 weeks on each Star Wars movie, 40ish weeks total for the whole OTā¦ā¦but composing the LOTR trilogyās soundtrack took four years
The vocals you hear in the soundtrack are usually in one of Tolkienās languages (esp. Elvish). The English translations of the lyrics are allĀ poems, or quotes from the book, or occasionally even quotes fromĀ other parts of the films that are relevant to the scene
When there were no finished scenes for him to score, Howard Shore would develop musical themes inspired by the scripts or passages from the book. Thatās how he got all Middle-Earth locations have their own unique sound: he was able to compose drafts ofĀ āwhat Gondor would sound likeā andĀ āwhat Lorien would sound likeā long before any scenes in those places were filmed
Shore has said his favorite parts to score were always the little heartfelt moments between Frodo and Sam
Shore wrote over 100 unique leitmotifs/musical themes to represent specific people, places, and things in Middle Earth (over 160 if you count The Hobbit)
The ones we all talk about are the Fellowship theme, the main Shire Theme, and the themes for places like Gondor, Mordor, Rohan, and Rivendellā¦but a lot of the more subtle ones get overlooked and underappreciated
Like Aragornās theme. Itās a lot lessĀ āobviousā than the others because, like Aragorn himself, it adapts to take on the color of whatever place Aragorn is in: itās played on dramatic broody stringed instruments in Bree, on horns inĀ battle scenes, softly on the flute with Arwen in Rivendellā¦.
Eowyn has not just one but three different leitmotifs to represent her
Gollum and SmeagolĀ both have their own leitmotifs! Whose theme music is playing in the scene can often tell you whether the Gollum or Smeagol side isĀ āwinningā at the moment
The melody for Gollumās Song in the end credits of the The Two Towers is the Smeagol and Gollum themes smushed together (itās Symbolic)
And then thereās the really obscure ones. Like thereās a melody that plays at Boromirās death that shows up again in ROTK in scenes that foreshadow a major death or loss
Wikipedia actually has a list of these leitmotifs, click this link and scroll down to check it out if youāre bored
Shore wanted the theme music to grow alongside the charactersā so that as the characters changed, their theme music would change with them.Ā Ā
You can hear that most clearly in the Shire theme. Like the hobbits, it goes through A LotĀ
Like compare the childish lil penny whistle theme you hear in Concerning Hobbits/the beginning of FOTR with (throws a dart at random Beautiful Tragic Hobbit Character Development scene because there WAY TOO MANY to choose from) the scene when Pippin finds Merry on the battlefield, where you hear a kind of shattered and broken but more mature version of that same theme in the backgroundĀ
I could write you a book on how much I love the way the Shire theme grows across the course of these filmsĀ
Unlike the heroās themes, which constantly change and grow, the villainās themes (The One Ring theme, the Isengard theme, etc) remain basically the same from the very beginning of FOTR to the end of ROTK. Shore said this was an intentional choice: to emphasize that evil is static, while good is capable of change
Shore has said that between all the music that made into the movies and the music that didnāt, he composed enough forĀ āa month of continuous listeningāā¦ā¦..where can I sign up
