美国国家公共电台 NPR What Does It Take To Write A Hit TV Theme Song?

 

ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:

The primetime Emmy Awards show is Sunday night. But some of this year's winners were announced days ago, among them the winner for best theme music. The right theme can command attention, set a mood, even land on the pop charts. As Tim Greiving reports, TV music is an art form all its own.

TIM GREIVING, BYLINE¹: A popular TV show can inject its music into the pop culture bloodstream.

(SOUNDBITE OF MARIUS CONSTANT'S "THE TWILIGHT² ZONE THEME")

GREIVING: As instantly recognizable as the "Twilight Zone" theme is, it was actually something composer Marius Constant had already written and was just sitting on a shelf.

(SOUNDBITE OF MARIUS CONSTANT'S "THE TWILIGHT ZONE THEME")

GREIVING: But this tune³ was specifically composed as the theme for another show.

(SOUNDBITE OF HENRY MANCINI'S "PETER GUNN THEME")

GREIVING: And it won two Grammys and broke into the top 10 in 1959.

(SOUNDBITE OF HENRY MANCINI'S "PETER GUNN THEME")

MIKE POST: Henry Mancini, "Peter Gunn."

GREIVING: Mike Post rattles⁴ off a few of his favorites.

POST: And probably the original "Wild Wild West" theme. I loved that theme.

(SOUNDBITE OF RICHARD MARKOWITZ'S "THE WILD WILD WEST THEME")

GREIVING: Post is a veteran TV composer himself who got his start as a session musician in Los Angeles. He played guitar on Sonny and Cher's "I Got You Babe" and won a Grammy for arranging the Mason Williams hit "Classical Gas."

POST: I was raised in the record business, you know? And to me, having a hit song was the goal. That was everything. And then when I just sort of fell into this business of being a composer for TV, all I was trying to do was write a 45-second, one-minute hit record.

GREIVING: His hits include "Magnum, P.I.," "The A-Team" and a tune that reached No. 10 on the hot 100 in 1975, "The Rockford Files."

(SOUNDBITE OF MIKE POST'S "THE ROCKFORD FILES THEME")

POST: I wanted to sign the signature for the show. But I also wanted them to walk out humming the thing.

GREIVING: Post says sometimes finding a theme can be laborious⁵. "L.A. Law" took him five tries. But sometimes it's effortless, like the theme for Steven Bochco's "Hill Street Blues⁶."

POST: He described, you know, the door going up on the garage and a patrol car going through really depressing cityscape. And Bochco said, what's that sound like? And I said, well, it could be kind of poignant⁷ and, like, the clock's going to tick. And I went the five minutes to my little office and I was in E-flat immediately. And I don't know how it happened. It just - 30 minutes later I called Bochco, I said, OK, I got it. So he came over and he listened. And he went, OK, that's my show. See you.

(SOUNDBITE OF MIKE POST'S "HILL STREET BLUES THEME")

GREIVING: One of the most ubiquitous TV themes was written in 1966 by Argentine composer Lalo Schifrin. But his first draft didn't fit the bill.

LALO SCHIFRIN: The one I came up was (imitating song).

(SOUNDBITE OF LALO SCHIFRIN'S "MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - THE PLOT")

SCHIFRIN: Bruce Geller, the producer, interesting the way he said it. I want you to write a theme that when people are in the kitchen having a soft drink and the television set is in their living room, they can hear from the kitchen and say, oh, "Mission: Impossible" is now. So that's what I did.

(SOUNDBITE OF LALO SCHIFRIN'S "MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - MAIN TITLE")

GREIVING: But around the turn of the millennium⁸, TV executives started chopping main title sequences down to 15 seconds or less, making themes about as musical as the sound of your computer booting up. Mike Post knows why.

POST: It isn't that they don't want main titles. It's that they want more commercials. They've got to make more money. They're on the Titanic⁹, you know, and they're discussing the color of the curtains and what the band's playing.

(SOUNDBITE OF LALO SCHIFRIN'S "MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - MAIN TITLE")

GREIVING: Enter streaming services like Amazon and Netflix, and the main title theme has come back with a vengeance¹⁰. Think of the bittersweet piano opening of "Transparent¹¹" or the noirish (ph) theme for "House Of Cards."

(SOUNDBITE OF JEFF BEAL'S "HOUSE OF CARDS THEME")

GREIVING: One theme in particular seems to have wormed its way into the ears of a new generation.

(SOUNDBITE OF KYLE DIXON AND MICHAEL STEIN'S "STRANGER THINGS THEME")

GREIVING: The "Stranger Things" theme seems to have resonated with Emmy voters as well. It won the award on Sunday for best original main title theme music. It was written by Austin-based composers Kyle Dixon and Michael Stein.

MICHAEL STEIN: I like the idea that they're microcompositions, in a way. Like, they're supposed to be conclusive¹² from beginning to end.

GREIVING: Like "The Twilight Zone," the "Stranger Things" theme wasn't written specifically for the show. Stein says it was in a batch¹³ of demos he and his partner sent to the creators of "Stranger Things." But it stuck the way a main theme is supposed to.

STEIN: It's kind of like the cover of a book. You see it, basically, and you want to read it. You hear it, you want to see the show.

GREIVING: Netflix may have helped bring back the television theme, but the company also recently added a feature that lets you skip it. "Stranger Things" co-composer Kyle Dixon says he doesn't really mind.

KYLE DIXON: Companies like Netflix, they have analytics that tell them, OK, everyone's skipping the theme song. We might as well just make it a button. I know I get mad. I want to skip the theme song.

GREIVING: Not me. For NPR News, I'm Tim Greiving in Los Angeles.

(SOUNDBITE OF KYLE DIXON AND MICHAEL STEIN'S "STRANGER THINGS THEME")

1 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

2 twilight   

n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期

参考例句：

• Twilight merged into darkness.夕阳的光辉融于黑暗中。
• Twilight was sweet with the smell of lilac and freshly turned earth.薄暮充满紫丁香和新翻耕的泥土的香味。

3 tune   

n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整

参考例句：

• He'd written a tune,and played it to us on the piano.他写了一段曲子，并在钢琴上弹给我们听。
• The boy beat out a tune on a tin can.那男孩在易拉罐上敲出一首曲子。

4 rattles   

（使）发出格格的响声， （使）作嘎嘎声( rattle的第三人称单数 )； 喋喋不休地说话； 迅速而嘎嘎作响地移动，堕下或走动； 使紧张，使恐惧

参考例句：

• It rattles the windowpane and sends the dog scratching to get under the bed. 它把窗玻璃震得格格作响，把狗吓得往床底下钻。
• How thin it is, and how dainty and frail; and how it rattles. 你看它够多么薄，多么精致，多么不结实；还老那么哗楞哗楞地响。

5 laborious   

adj.吃力的，努力的，不流畅

参考例句：

• They had the laborious task of cutting down the huge tree.他们接受了伐大树的艰苦工作。
• Ants and bees are laborious insects.蚂蚁与蜜蜂是勤劳的昆虫。

6 blues   

n.抑郁，沮丧；布鲁斯音乐

参考例句：

• She was in the back of a smoky bar singing the blues.她在烟雾弥漫的酒吧深处唱着布鲁斯歌曲。
• He was in the blues on account of his failure in business.他因事业失败而意志消沉。

7 poignant   

adj.令人痛苦的，辛酸的，惨痛的

参考例句：

• His lyrics are as acerbic and poignant as they ever have been.他的歌词一如既往的犀利辛辣。
• It is especially poignant that he died on the day before his wedding.他在婚礼前一天去世了，这尤其令人悲恸。

8 millennium   

n.一千年，千禧年；太平盛世

参考例句：

• The whole world was counting down to the new millennium.全世界都在倒计时迎接新千年的到来。
• We waited as the clock ticked away the last few seconds of the old millennium.我们静候着时钟滴答走过千年的最后几秒钟。

9 titanic   

adj.巨人的，庞大的，强大的

参考例句：

• We have been making titanic effort to achieve our purpose.我们一直在作极大的努力，以达到我们的目的。
• The island was created by titanic powers and they are still at work today.台湾岛是由一个至今仍然在运作的巨大力量塑造出来的。

10 vengeance   

n.报复，报仇，复仇

参考例句：

• He swore vengeance against the men who murdered his father.他发誓要向那些杀害他父亲的人报仇。
• For years he brooded vengeance.多年来他一直在盘算报仇。

11 transparent   

adj.明显的，无疑的；透明的

参考例句：

• The water is so transparent that we can see the fishes swimming.水清澈透明，可以看到鱼儿游来游去。
• The window glass is transparent.窗玻璃是透明的。

12 conclusive   

adj.最后的，结论的；确凿的，消除怀疑的

参考例句：

• They produced some fairly conclusive evidence.他们提供了一些相当确凿的证据。
• Franklin did not believe that the French tests were conclusive.富兰克林不相信这个法国人的实验是结论性的。

13 batch   

n.一批(组，群)；一批生产量

参考例句：

• The first batch of cakes was burnt.第一炉蛋糕烤焦了。
• I have a batch of letters to answer.我有一批信要回复。