Leitmotif

For the album of the same name, see Leitmotif (album).

Leitmotif associated with Siegfried in Richard Wagner's opera of the same name

A leitmotif or leitmotiv /ˌlaɪtmoʊˈtiːf/ is a "short, constantly recurring musical phrase" associated with a particular person, place, or idea. It is closely related to the musical concepts of idée fixe or motto-theme. The spelling leitmotif is an anglicization of the German Leitmotiv (IPA: [ˈlaɪtmoˌtiːf]), literally meaning "leading motif", or perhaps more accurately, "guiding motif". A musical motif has been defined as a "short musical idea ... melodic, harmonic, or rhythmic, or all three", a salient recurring figure, musical fragment or succession of notes that has some special importance in or is characteristic of a composition: "the smallest structural unit possessing thematic identity."

In particular, such a motif should be "clearly identified so as to retain its identity if modified on subsequent appearances" whether such modification be in terms of rhythm, harmony, orchestration or accompaniment. It may also be "combined with other leitmotifs to suggest a new dramatic condition" or development. The technique is notably associated with the operas of Richard Wagner, and most especially his Der Ring des Nibelungen, although he was not its originator and did not employ the word in connection with his work.

Although usually a short melody, it can also be a chord progression or even a simple rhythm. Leitmotifs can help to bind a work together into a coherent whole, and also enable the composer to relate a story without the use of words, or to add an extra level to an already present story.

By association, the word has also been used to mean any sort of recurring theme, (whether or not subject to developmental transformation) in literature, or (metaphorically) the life of a fictional character or a real person. It is sometimes also used in discussion of other musical genres, such as instrumental pieces, cinema, and video game music, sometimes interchangeably with the more general category of theme. Such usage typically obscures the crucial aspect of a leitmotif—as opposed to the plain musical motif or theme—that it is transformable and recurs in different guises throughout the piece in which it occurs.

Classical music

Early instances in classical music

The use of characteristic, short, recurring motives in orchestral music can be traced back to the early seventeenth century, such as L'Orfeo by Monteverdi. In French opera of the late eighteenth century, (such as the works of Gluck, Grétry and Méhul), "reminiscence motif" can be identified, which may recur at a significant juncture in the plot to establish an association with earlier events. Their use, however, is not extensive or systematic. The power of the technique was exploited early in the nineteenth century by composers of Romantic opera, such as Carl Maria von Weber, where recurring themes or ideas were sometimes used in association with specific characters (e.g. Samiel in Der Freischütz is coupled with the chord of a diminished seventh). Indeed, the first use of the word leitmotif in print was by the critic Friedrich Wilhelm Jähns in describing Weber's work, although this was not until 1871.

Motives also figured occasionally in purely instrumental music of the romantic period. The related idea of the musical idée fixe was coined by Hector Berlioz in reference to his Symphonie fantastique (1830). This purely instrumental, programmatic work (subtitled Episode in the Life of an Artist) features a recurring melody representing the object of the artist's obsessive affection and depicting her presence in various real and imagined situations.

Wagner

The Siegfried leitmotif from Act III of Wagner's opera, the third of his Ring cycle; the theme is broader and more richly orchestrated than its earlier appearances, suggesting the emergence of Siegfried's heroic character.

Richard Wagner is the earliest composer most specifically associated with the concept of leitmotif. His cycle of four operas, Der Ring des Nibelungen (the music for which was written between 1853 and 1869), uses hundreds of leitmotifs, often related to specific characters, things, or situations. While some of these leitmotifs occur in only one of the operas, many recur throughout the entire cycle. Wagner had raised the issue of how music could best unite disparate elements of the plot of a music drama in his essay "Opera and Drama" (1851); the leitmotif technique corresponds to this ideal.

Some controversy surrounded the use of the word in Wagner's own circle: Wagner never authorised the use of the word leitmotiv, using words such as "Grundthema" (basic idea), or simply "Motiv". His preferred name for the technique was Hauptmotiv (principal motif), which he first used in 1877; the only time he used the word Leitmotiv, he referred to "so-called Leitmotivs".

The word gained currency with the overly literal interpretations of Wagner's music by Hans von Wolzogen, who in 1876 published a Leitfaden (guide or manual) to the Ring. In it he claimed to have isolated and named all of the recurring motifs in the cycle (the motif of "Servitude", the "Spear" or "Treaty" motif, etc.), often leading to absurdities or contradictions with Wagner's actual practice. Some of the motifs he identified began to appear in the published musical scores of the operas, arousing Wagner's annoyance; his wife Cosima Wagner quoted him as saying "People will think all this nonsense is done at my request!". In fact Wagner himself never publicly named any of his leitmotifs, preferring to emphasise their flexibility of association, role in the musical form, and emotional effect. The practice of naming leitmotifs nevertheless continued, featuring in the work of prominent Wagnerian critics Ernest Newman, Deryck Cooke and Robert Donington.

The resulting lists of leitmotifs also attracted the ridicule of anti-Wagnerian critics and composers (such as Eduard Hanslick, Claude Debussy, and Igor Stravinsky). They identified the motif with Wagner's own approach to composing, mocking the impression of a musical "address book" or list of "cloakroom numbers" it created.

After Wagner

The leitmotif associated with Salome herself in Richard Strauss's opera Salome.

Since Wagner, the use of leitmotifs has been taken up by many other composers. Richard Strauss used the device in many of his operas and several of his symphonic poems. Despite his sometimes acerbic comments on Wagner, Claude Debussy utilised leitmotifs in his opera Pelléas et Mélisande (1902). Arnold Schoenberg used a complex set of leitmotifs in his choral work Gurre-Lieder (completed 1911). Alban Berg's opera Wozzeck (1914–1922) also utilises leitmotifs. The leitmotif was also a major feature of the opera The Immortal Hour by the English composer Rutland Boughton. His constantly recurrent, memorably tuneful leitmotifs contributed in no small way to the widespread popularity of the opera.

Critique of the leitmotif concept

The critic Theodor W. Adorno, in his book In Search of Wagner (written in the 1930s), expresses the opinion that the entire concept of the leitmotif is flawed. The motif cannot be both the bearer of expression and a musical 'gesture', because that reduces emotional content to a mechanical process. He notes that 'even in Wagner's own day the public made a crude link between the leitmotivs and the persons they characterised' because people's innate mental processes did not necessarily correspond with Wagner's subtle intentions or optimistic expectations. He continues:

The degeneration of the leitmotiv is implicit in this ... it leads directly to cinema music where the sole function of the leitmotiv is to announce heroes or situations so as to allow the audience to orient itself more easily.

Film

Leitmotifs in Adorno's "degenerated" sense frequently occur in film scores, and have since the early decades of sound film. One of the first people to implement Leitmotif in early sound films was Fritz Lang in his revolutionary hit M. Lang set the benchmark for sound film through his use of leitmotif, creating a different type of atmosphere in his films. Erich Wolfgang Korngold's 1938 score for The Adventures of Robin Hood, for example, can be heard to attach particular themes and harmonies to individual characters: Robin, Will, Much, and Gisbourne are all accompanied by distinctive musical material. A more modern example is the Star Wars series, in which composer John Williams uses a large number of themes specifically associated with people and concepts (for example, a particular motif attaches to the presence of Darth Vader and another to the idea of the Force). In the film trilogy Lord of the Rings (Composer Howard Leslie Shore) the dramatic orchestral score has about a hundred Leitmotifs recurring throughout. The main ideology behind Leitmotif is to create a sense of attachment to that particular sound that evokes audiences to feel particular emotions when that sound is repeated through the film.

Literature and drama

See also: Motif (narrative)

Leitmotif is sometimes used by literary or dramatic critics to refer to a recurring event, image, object or character in a story, poem, film or play. Leitmotifs (or motifs) become significant to the meaning of the overall work when they develop thematic importance. In film, such a motif is most frequently a plot device, image, character trait, or element of the mise en scène.

Leitmotif-like techniques, with word patterns replacing melodies, are used in Ulysses and Finnegans Wake by James Joyce. Here's an example of one from various parts of Finnegans Wake:

"wasching the walters of, the weltering walters off. Whyte." 64.20
"and watch her waters of her sillying waters of" 74.29
"And his dithering dathering waltzers of. Stright!" 245.22
"arride the winnerful wonders off, the winnerful wonnerful wanders off" 265.15
"baffling with the walters of, hoompsydoompsy walters of. High!" 373.06
"Amingst the living waters of, the living in giving waters of. Tight!" 462.04

Leitmotifs are also said to be present in the works of Samuel Beckett, Virginia Woolf, Kurt Vonnegut, Joseph Heller, Thomas Mann, Chuck Palahniuk, Julian Barnes, and Günter Grass's among several other writers.

See also

• Image song
• Motif (music)
• Motif (literature)
• Motif (art)
• Ostinato
• Theme music

Sources and further reading

• Theodor Adorno, tr. Rodney Livingstone, In Search of Wagner, London 2005 (ISBN 978-1-84467-344-5)
• Peter Burbidge and Richard Sutton, The Wagner Companion, London, 1979. ISBN 0-571-11450-4
• R. Donnington, Wagner's 'Ring' and its Symbols, London, 1979
• William Drabkin, 'Motif', in New Grove Dictionary of Music, London 1995, vol. 12
• Donald Jay Grout and Hermine Weigel Williams (2003). A Short History of Opera (4th ed.). Columbia University Press. ISBN 0-231-11958-5
• H. Rosenthal and J. Warrack (eds.), Concise Oxford Dictionary of Opera, Oxford 1979
• Michael Kennedy, The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music, Oxford, 1987. ISBN 978-0-19-311320-6.
• Barry Millington (ed.), The Wagner Compendium, London 1992
• Alexander Rehding, review of Christian Thorau, "Semantisierte Sinnlichkeit: Studien zu Rezeption und Zeichenstruktur der Leitmotivtechnik Richard Wagners" in Opera Quarterly vol. 23 (Oxford, 2007) pp. 348–351
• Christian Thorau, "Guides for Wagnerites: Letimotifs and Wagnerian Listening", in T. Grey, (ed.), Richard Wagner and his World, (pp. 133–150) Princeton 2009 ISBN 978-0-691-14366-8
• Cosima Wagner, tr. Geoffrey Skelton, Cosima Wagner's Diaries (2 vols.), London 1980.
• John Warrack, "Leitmotif", in New Grove Dictionary of Music, London 1995, vol. 10
• John D. White, The Analysis of Music, (1976). ISBN 0-13-033233-X
• Doug Adams, "The Music of the Lord of the Rings Films", (2010) Carpentier ISBN 978-0-7390-7157-1