Tropedia

  • Before making a single edit, Tropedia EXPECTS our site policy and manual of style to be followed. Failure to do so may result in deletion of contributions and blocks of users who refuse to learn to do so. Our policies can be reviewed here.
  • All images MUST now have proper attribution, those who neglect to assign at least the "fair use" licensing to an image may have it deleted. All new pages should use the preloadable templates feature on the edit page to add the appropriate basic page markup. Pages that don't do this will be subject to deletion, with or without explanation.
  • All new trope pages will be made with the "Trope Workshop" found on the "Troper Tools" menu and worked on until they have at least three examples. The Trope workshop specific templates can then be removed and it will be regarded as a regular trope page after being moved to the Main namespace. THIS SHOULD BE WORKING NOW, REPORT ANY ISSUES TO Janna2000, SelfCloak or RRabbit42. DON'T MAKE PAGES MANUALLY UNLESS A TEMPLATE IS BROKEN, AND REPORT IT THAT IS THE CASE. PAGES WILL BE DELETED OTHERWISE IF THEY ARE MISSING BASIC MARKUP.

READ MORE

Tropedia
Register
Advertisement
WikEd fancyquotesQuotesBug-silkHeadscratchersIcons-mini-icon extensionPlaying WithUseful NotesMagnifierAnalysisPhoto linkImage LinksHaiku-wide-iconHaikuLaconic
Now found in more places than the music store.


Cquote1
"Steve's dead now. From here on in, Steve's death will be represented by the oboe."
Tom Servo , Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode # 209, "The Hellcats"
Cquote2


A leitmotif is a piece of music used repeatedly to represent a character, theme, or action. This is a well-established technique used in almost every medium that involves music and story. The leitmotif technique was invented (or at least perfected) by opera composer Richard Wagner in the second half of the 1800s. In his operas, not only would every character have his/her own motif, but also objects, places, and even abstract ideas.

Leitmotifs are often named simply "<character>'s Theme" or "<noun> Motif." They often make up the bulk of movie and anime soundtracks, and a fair chunk of video game soundtracks as well.

This is different from an Image Song in that Image Songs exist only outside of the scope of the show that produced them. Compare with "I Am" Song.

If a character with a distinctive-sounding Leitmotif is in a production or episode that breaks the Fourth Wall, one of his or her fellows may come to make a comment on how loud and annoying their theme music is. (To which the character will almost always reply, "What theme music?") Might be a Musical Spoiler for audiences. The character might also have their leitmotif as their own klingelton, for a subtler joke. See also Left the Background Music On.

If a character's leitmotif starts playing during an action scene, start running.

Can become a Recurring Riff when used throughout a long-running series. In video games, there's also the Battle Theme Music. (If a character's Battle Theme Music is a remix of their Leitmotif, it's a Boss Remix.) Bootstrapped Leitmotif is a variation, where a song that wasn't originally intended as a Leitmotif later becomes one.

See also Mood Motif, Standard Snippet.

Examples of Leitmotif include:


Advertisement