Can any music experts explain to me why the TNG theme is so good? (lemmy.ml)

submitted 1 year ago by maegul@lemmy.ml to c/startrek@startrek.website

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There's something about the TNG theme (played during the opening credits) that seems unique and special to my ear. But I don't know about music and orchestral production to make sense of it.

It sounds to me like the mix or maybe arrangement is somewhat unusual, even compared to other TNG era star trek themes. It seems to have a brightness and sheen to its tones that are almost synth like (??) But also the arrangement seems to hit some sweet sci-fi spot, like the way strings and trumpets with oboes/clarinets underneath (??) all mix together? Or is the chords that are played some where?

I don't know, but I've always thought it had a sheen and sparkle that almost sounds like star trek (or at least TNG star trek).

Anyone else notice something similar? Anyone know what's going on?

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[-] yildo@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago

The time signature (I had to Google) starts in the common 4/4 but then switches into 12/8 or 6/8 which has a lot of flavour

[-] maegul@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 year ago

Ooohhh ... interesting ... any links or can you roughly point me to the part where shift happens? Inuitively this makes sense though that there's a kind of rhythmic drive that comes out midway.

[-] yildo@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago

I'm sure I saw an interesting article about it many years ago, but this is the best I can find right now: https://www.reddit.com/r/startrek/comments/ql0bsd/what_time_signature_is_the_tng_theme/

[-] maegul@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

I'm sorry ... that URL doesn't work in browser for some reason. 😏

But also thanks!!

this post was submitted on 11 Jul 2023

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