Film Noir

Musical

Example

Film Noir Secret

Score

Film Noir Music/

Score

Melody

Now that we have established our harmonic feel, we can concentrate on the melody. Remember, we have just determined that the note D (played by the violins) is important to our harmony. Therefore, we will compose a melody that makes frequent use of that note:

Notice that we have composed a melody line not only for the alto saxophone but also for the violins.

Let's take a closer look at the saxophone and violins parts. As we previously discussed, the violins start by playing the note D. This completes the harmony we already established with the basses, cellos and violas.

But there is something very interesting about to happen. Once the violins establish a note or a moving line, it is echoed soon after by the alto sax.

This next chart will illustrate that melodic echo:

As you can see from this chart, the first long note of the sax in bar 2 is an echo of the violins from bar 1. Then, starting in bar 3 beat 3, the sax echoes four notes from the violins. Those violin notes preceded the sax by four beats, starting from the middle of bar 2. Finally in bar 5, the sax note echoes the violins from bar 3 beat 3. These echo effects contribute to the haunting quality of the music.

Also, notice that both the sax and violins make use of the note Eb in their melody. This reveals to us that, although our overall harmony is rather ambiguous, we are really in the key of C minor. Therefore, the use of the Eb clearly defines our harmony.