Another thing I LOVE about adaptations of Lord of the Rings is all the different songs created to represent Grey Havens.
Every adaptation creates a piece of music to represent the Grey Havens/Frodo and Sam’s farewell-- because it’s one of the most memorable places and heart-wrenching farewells in all of fiction.
“Then Frodo kissed Merry and Pippin, and last of all Sam, and went aboard; and the sails were drawn up, and the wind blew, and slowly the ship slipped away down the long grey firth; and the light of the glass of Galadriel that Frodo bore glimmered and was lost. And the ship went out into the High Sea and passed on into the West, until at last on a night of rain Frodo smelled a sweet fragrance on the air and heard the sound of singing that came over the water. And then it seemed to him that as in his dream in the house of Bombadil, the grey rain-curtain turned all to silver glass and was rolled back, and he beheld white shores and beyond them a far green country under a swift sunrise.
But to Sam the evening deepened to darkness as he stood at the Haven; and as he looked at the grey sea he saw only a shadow on the waters that was soon lost in the West. There still he stood far into the night, hearing only the sigh and murmur of the waves on the shores of Middle-earth, and the sound of them sank deep into his heart.”
And the question adaptations have to answer is....how do you interpret that feeling, musically?
The most well known Grey Havens Song is probably Into the West from the Peter Jackson films:
“Lay down
Your sweet and weary head
Night is falling
You have come to journey’s end...”
We could spend the entire post talking about all the great Grey Havens music from the Jackson films (lol), but since I want to talk about the other adaptations too I’ll try to be brief:
The soundtrack that plays during the Grey Havens scene is utterly heartbreaking, soul-shattering, one of the best pieces of music ever composed. (tumblr has a 5 video limit so I can’t add it to this post but like..click the link to.re-listen to it....I aLWaYs forget how beautiful it is until I listen to it again.)
But here are a couple other Howard Shore Grey Havens themes I feel are underrated:
Use Well the Days is Frodo’s song to Sam, in the same way Into the West is Sam’s song to Frodo. Use Well the Days was eventually cut from the soundtrack in favor of Into the West. (it shouldn’t have been cut! we should’ve had both songs! I am very passionate about this!)
“Night too shall be beautiful
And blessed and its fear will pass.
I must leave, must cross the sea,
The love you gave is all I take with me.....”
Bilbo’s Song is only in the end credits and complete recordings. It’s an elvish version of one of Bilbo’s songs from the book, and represents Bilbo going to the Grey Havens.
Frodo’s Song is an unfinished early draft of an end credits song that was eventually shelved in favor of Use Well the Days and Into the West. It’s based around the Shire leitmotif, and sounds like a lullaby or a love song.
But to move on from the Jackson films:
Another sEVERELY underrated Grey Havens song is “Roads Go Ever, Ever On” from the end of the Rankin-Bass adaptation of Return of the King. It’s very sweet and humble and melancholy.
Roads go ever, ever on
To the lands beyond the sea
On a white ship will I sail
Watching shadows part for me.
Leaving havens grey with rain
Now that years have slipped away
Leaving friends with gentle pain
As they start another day.
Roads I traveled I must leave---
For I’ve turned the final bend.
Weep not empty tears, but grieve
As the road comes to an end.
It’s so easy not to try
Let the world go drifting by
If you never say ‘hello,’
You won’t have to say goodbye.
I’ve never played LOTR online, but the Grey Havens theme from it is lovely:
And the Grey Havens theme from the LOTR musical is so beautiful and tragic too. It does a similar thing to the Howard Shore Grey Havens theme where it calls back to a bunch of leitmotifs that have been used throughout the story. I also like how at about 1:20 in, the stringed instruments/choir in the background are made to sound like waves, kinda ebbing in and out.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wn_is4HX2Z4&list=PLC15BA24798B05CD4&index=18&t=0s
I don’t know..... to me it’s so interesting to see all the different ways the idea of this tragic farewell is captured in song, all the different emotions this one moment made all these different writers and performers and artists feel.
It’s why I wish Lord of the Rings was in the public domain-- I want more versions of the Grey Havens, I want even more different interpretations of it.
The Return of the King ends with Frodo passing on the Red Book to Sam, and telling him it’s his turn to continue the story.
And I think when Frodo passed the book on to Sam, he also passed it on to all future writers and artists, who (like Sam) now all get a chance to reinterpret the story and find out what it means to them.
