Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works, Hey, brain Stuff,
Speaker 1: Lauren Vogel, Bam here, you've heard it during Star Wars,
Speaker 1: The Shining even Home alone. For decades, clever composers have
Speaker 1: woven elements of a particular medieval dirge into film soundtracks
Speaker 1: to convey a sense of dread and general doom where
Speaker 1: the script calls for it no widely as the Day
Speaker 1: of Wrath. The original Latin title for this piece is
Speaker 1: ds Era, which can also translate to such sunny concepts
Speaker 1: as Judgment Day, the end of the world, and death
Speaker 1: in general. The piece features a mere handful of notes.
Speaker 1: Here's the basic tune. It was originally composed back in
Speaker 1: the thirteenth century by a Franciscan monk named Thomas of Solano.
Speaker 1: Little did he know that one day his piece would
Speaker 1: be revered, repurposed, and otherwise showcased in many of the
Speaker 1: biggest films to hit Hollywood. Hardly what we would call
Speaker 1: a complex musical work by today's standards, the piece doubles
Speaker 1: as a requiem chant and features some pretty sobering Latin
Speaker 1: lyrics translated into English. The first two lines read day
Speaker 1: of Wrath, the Day that will dissolve the world into
Speaker 1: burning coals. Here's a sample. Yes Yes, Mozart and Verity
Speaker 1: are just two of the composers who wrote original requiems
Speaker 1: based on ds era. The hymn's first big movie exposure
Speaker 1: was in Citizen Kane, but the musical motif once you
Speaker 1: Know what to look For is ubiquitous. It's prominently featured
Speaker 1: in the opening strains of The Shining and a variation
Speaker 1: on it is included in the ultra famous Jaws theme.
Speaker 1: Very appropriately, we might add the shark is death and
Speaker 1: doom manifested. It's in Star Wars when Luke Skywalker faces
Speaker 1: the loss of his aunt and uncle, and it's used
Speaker 1: throughout the Lord of the Ring series to build a
Speaker 1: sense of foreboding. Occasionally, composers go with a winking approach
Speaker 1: when incorporating the dirge into a soundtrack. In the stop
Speaker 1: motion animated film The Nightmare Before Christmas, an entire song
Speaker 1: Making Christmas is based around the sequence. In Making, and
Speaker 1: in the nineties blockbuster hit Home Alone, our young hero
Speaker 1: Kevin is regaled with the urban legend of old Man Marley,
Speaker 1: the rumored South Bend shovel slayer. When Kevin lays his
Speaker 1: Eyes on the Guy, composer John Williams cues up a
Speaker 1: well placed strain of ds eerie to get the point
Speaker 1: across Kevin is terrified and his imagination is running away
Speaker 1: with him. But ds erae isn't only effective in films.
Speaker 1: The University of Georgia, for example, uses it to intimidate
Speaker 1: their opponents into accepting the impending doom that the song implies.
Speaker 1: It's a staple at u g A football games and
Speaker 1: is frequently played for the crowd by the Georgia Redcoat
Speaker 1: Marching Band m. Today's episode was written by Elia Hoyt
Speaker 1: and produced by Tyler Clang, with musical cues provided by
Speaker 1: David W. Collins. For more from David, including a full
Speaker 1: and may I say fabulous episode about ds era as
Speaker 1: popular music's word for death, check out his podcast The
Speaker 1: Soundtrack Show, available wherever you get your podcasts, and of course,
Speaker 1: for lots more on this and other topics that spell doom,
Speaker 1: visit our home planet how Stuff Works dot com