Doctor Who theme music
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The Doctor Who theme music was created in 1963, composed by Ron Grainer and "realised" with electronics by Delia Derbyshire of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. The theme was one of the first electronic music signature tunes for television. Its haunting and ethereal sound has become as indelibly associated with the programme as the TARDIS or the Daleks, and the theme has endured over four decades.
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[edit] History
[edit] 1960s
The original 1963 arrangement of the Doctor Who theme is widely regarded as a significant and innovative piece of electronic music. Recorded before the widespread introduction of synthesisers, Delia Derbyshire used musique concrète techniques. Each and every note was painstakingly handcrafted using pre-recorded individually struck piano strings as well as electronic equipment such as wave signal generators, noise generators, filters and square- and sine-wave oscillators (which were themselves rare at the time), with the results pitch-shifted if necessary. Finally each note, on magnetic tape, was cut up and joined together in the correct order.
Grainer was amazed at the resulting piece of music and when he heard it, famously asked, "Did I write that?". Derbyshire replied that he mostly had. Unfortunately, the BBC — who wanted to keep members of the Workshop anonymous — prevented Grainer from getting Derbyshire a co-composer credit and a share of the royalties.
The theme can be divided into several distinctive parts. A rhythmic bassline opens and underlies the theme throughout, followed by a rising and falling set of notes that forms the main melody which is repeated several times. The bridge, also known as the "middle eight", is an uplifting interlude that usually features in the closing credits or the full version of the theme. During the early years of the series, however, the middle eight was also often heard during the opening credits (most notably in the first episode, An Unearthly Child).
The theme has been often cited as being both memorable as well as frightening, priming the viewer for what was to follow. During the 1970s, the Radio Times, the BBC's own listings magazine, announced that a child's mother said the theme music terrified her son. The Radio Times was apologetic, but the theme music remained.
Derbyshire created two arrangements in 1963: the first was released as a single, but was rejected by the producers. The second arrangement was used on the first episode of the programme. The two 1963 arrangements served, with minor edits and additions requested by the producers — most notably the addition of reverberation during the Patrick Troughton era and the "sting" at the start of the closing credits during the Jon Pertwee years — as the theme tune up to 1980 and the end of Season 17. In 2002, Mark Ayres used Derbyshire's original masters to mix a full stereo version of the theme.
[edit] 1970s
During the Third Doctor's era beginning in 1970, the "sting", an electronic shriek, was added to punctuate the episode cliffhangers and serve as a lead-in to the closing theme. A few episodes such as Spearhead from Space also used a slight rearrangement of the Derbyshire theme for the closing credits; the "middle eight" section was not heard very often during the Third Doctor era; during the era of the Fourth Doctor, the "middle eight" was usually only heard during the closing credits of the final episode of the season. For unexplained reasons, the first three serials of Season 8 reverted to the 1967 arrangement before reinstating the Third Doctor's arrangement for the last two serials of that year.
In 1972, there was an attempt by Brian Hodgson and Paddy Kingsland, with Delia Derbyshire acting as producer, to modernise the theme tune using the Radiophonic Workshop's modular "Delaware" synthesiser (named after the Workshop's location at Delaware Road). The "Delaware" arrangement, which had a distinct Jew's harp sound, was not well received by BBC executives and was abandoned, with the master tapes being lost and the episodes that used it redubbed with the old Derbyshire arrangement. However, the Delaware version was accidentally left on some episodes which were sold to Australia, and survives today in this form. (The complete version of this arrangement of the music is included as an extra on the DVD release of Carnival of Monsters.)
[edit] 1980s
In 1980, the show's new producer, John Nathan-Turner, wanted to modernise the theme music for Season 18. Radiophonic Workshop staffer Peter Howell provided a new arrangement performed on analogue synthesisers, giving a more dynamic and glossy, but less haunting feel. Its bassline was created on a Yamaha CS-80 synthesizer, with added echo. The 1980 arrangement added the sting to the opening theme as well, while the "middle eight" was included in the closing theme arrangement of all episodes.
The Howell theme was eventually replaced by a new arrangement by Dominic Glynn for Season 23's The Trial of a Time Lord (1986). This synthesizer-driven version was arranged to sound more mysterious than previous renditions, but was only used for this single season of the series.
The Glynn arrangement was itself replaced by a new arrangement by Keff McCulloch for the Seventh Doctor's era beginning with Season 24 (1987), with the sting in this version being replaced by a crashing note instead of a shriek. Nathan-Turner stated that the new music, logo and title sequence were to signal a fresh start to the programme. This was the first version of the theme since the arrangement used in 1963-66 to incorporate the "middle eight" into the opening credits.
[edit] 1990s
The 1996 Doctor Who television Movie used a fully orchestrated version, arranged by John Debney (although Debney later revealed that he had originally intended to replace the original theme with one of his own design). This contained a new introduction, being a quieter piece of music over which part of the Eighth Doctor's (Paul McGann) opening narration was read, building up to a crescendo as it began with the "middle eight", a departure from previous versions of the theme.
[edit] 2000s
When Big Finish Productions began to produce Eighth Doctor audio plays in 2001 (beginning with Storm Warning), they approached composer David Arnold, who produced a new arrangement of the Doctor Who theme for the Eighth Doctor. The Arnold arrangement has been used for every Eighth Doctor audio play since.
In 2005, the television series was revived. Murray Gold's arrangement of the theme for the 2005 series featured samples from the 1963 original with further elements added, including orchestral sounds (low horns, strings, percussion) and part of the Dalek ray-gun and TARDIS materialisation sound effects. The sting once again served as the lead-in to the theme, but Gold omitted the "middle eight" from both the opening and closing credits. He has said that his interpretation was driven by the title visual sequence he was given to work around.[citation needed]
Gold created a variation on his arrangement for the closing credits of The Christmas Invasion which was performed by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales. Unlike his arrangement for the 2005 series, this version restored the "middle eight"; it was also used for the closing credits of the 2006 series.
A soundtrack of Gold's incidental music for the new series was released by Silva Screen Records on December 4, 2006.[1] [2]
[edit] Remixes, remakes, inspirations and references
In 1972, Jon Pertwee recorded a version of the Doctor Who theme, with spoken lyrics, entitled "Who Is The Doctor". This song would later be covered in 2004 by comedy/novelty band The Nick Atoms.
In 1988, the band The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu (later known as The KLF) released the single "Doctorin' the Tardis" under the name The Timelords. The song used samples from Doctor Who, Gary Glitter's "Rock and Roll (Part 1)" (or possibly "Rock and Roll (Part 2)" — the sections used are not specific enough to tell), and Sweet's "Blockbuster", with lyrics chanting about the Doctor, the TARDIS, and Daleks. "Doctorin' the Tardis" reached number one in the UK Singles Chart on 12 June, and also charted highly in Australia and New Zealand. The song, along with "Rock and Roll (Part 2)", was combined with Green Day's "Holiday" for "Dr. Who on Holiday", a track on the mash up album American Edit.
Other bands have covered or reinterpreted the Doctor Who theme, such as DJ duo Coldcut, the electronica band Orbital, the bands Dr. Pablo and Dub Syndicate, New Zealand band Blam Blam Blam, and the Australian string ensemble Fourplay. The Pogues (intentionally, according to an interview) used a bass line in their song "Wild Cats of Kilkenny" (from Rum, Sodomy & the Lash) that is similar to the Doctor Who theme, as did Pink Floyd in their song "One of These Days" (from Meddle in 1971), which featured a brief pedal steel guitar solo that echoed the theme's melody; the musical link is more obvious in the live versions on Delicate Sound of Thunder and P*U*L*S*E. (This solo was copied again for the midsection of "Raving And Drooling", an early version of "Sheep" from the Animals album played in 1974 and 1975.) The Australian folk band Bullamakanka recorded a song called "Doctor Who is Gonna Fix It" in 1983.
The comedian Bill Bailey produced a humorous interpretation, "Dr. Qui", in the style of Belgian jazz; he also has a routine about incidental music from Doctor Who that ends with a more traditional version. Nu-metal band Slipknot are fans of the series, and the track "Prelude 3.0" on their third album, Volume 3: The Subliminal Verses is also based around the theme tune and dedicated to the series. In 2005, the Scottish band Franz Ferdinand appeared on stage to Peter Howell's arrangement of the theme.
US band The Mars Volta, who claim Doctor Who as an influence, have played the music over the P.A. after their gigs have ended.
Fan musicians, both professional and amateur, have produced their own remixes of the theme music for non-commercial distribution. Many of these remixes are available for download from whomix.trilete.net, which also offers a podcast subscription for new tracks added to the site.
Many bands have used samples of the theme song, dialogue and/or sound effects from Doctor Who in otherwise unrelated songs, notably Spiderbait (in several tracks from Shashavaglava) and Eat Static (most prominently on their album Abduction).
In BBC Radio 4's topical comedy programme The Now Show, Mitch Benn mentioned hiding in his "safe place" before humming the Doctor Who theme music.
[edit] Footnotes
- ^ Silva Screen Records News
- ^ BBC - Doctor Who - News - Soundtrack details. BBC (November 06, 2006). Retrieved on 2006-11-09.
[edit] See also
- Doctor Who theme excerpt (file info) — play in browser (beta)
- An excerpt from the theme music to Doctor Who from 1963
- Problems listening to the file? See media help.
[edit] External links
- A history of the Doctor Who theme
- BBC link to original Doctor Who theme excerpt (with video, RealMedia format)
- BBC Worldwide Doctor Who theme ringtone (commercial BBC Worldwide link)
- BBC Radiophon-A-Tron - Mix Your Own Version of the Doctor Who theme!
- Doctor Who theme remixes - fan-made remixes of the theme
