Leitmotif in Hollow Knight's Soundtrack

[Music] in this series we've been looking mostly at how hollow Knights soundtrack develops themes across multiple pieces of music the consistency of the soundtracks atmosphere and use of late motifs to reflect specific characters and places is in perfect balance with the wide variety of styles and arrangements that adapt to different parts of the game making it feel like you're experiencing one huge living piece of music that grows and evolves around you as you explore the game's world I want to continue with this tram of thought here this time diving into arguably the most important musical motif in the game the hollow Knight theme the piece named hollow knight on the official soundtrack and arguably the main theme of the game is the music that plays over top of the main menu this might make it seem unimportant I mean how often do you have to pay attention to a game's menu music after all but as the very first thing that you encounter when you boot up the game it serves a vital role in setting the tone for the adventure you're about to embark on and set the tone it does the instrumentation of piano and viola duet coupled with the slow tempo and natural minor harmony set the stage for an intimate yet solemn dark yet elegant adventure [Music] the piano and viola are definitely key players throughout the soundtrack to the point that viola player Timothy teal was the only musician hired on to record the music rather than using VST s so showcasing them in the games menu like this for shadows the instrumental identity of the games music in general there are more specific musical elements that foreshadow the Sam tracks tone as well I've mentioned these before in the series but the emphasis of the second over a minor chord as in the first phrase is a color that is used all over the game score and the use of a pedal tone as in the accompaniment is frequently employed as an atmospheric technique throughout holo nights soundtrack take a look at this accompaniment figure with this descending to note pattern grounded by a pedaled C note on the first beat of every bar [Music] the melody develops out in an extended call-and-response pattern throughout this theme but for the purposes of this video the important phrases to remember are the first two this 1 2 flat 3 2 motif and the following one 5 flat 6 5 4 5 especially the first 3 notes these work wonderfully as light motifs for two reasons they're simple and they're recognizable for a motif to work in multiple musical environments it needs to be malleable enough to fit into a variety of settings and to function as a late motif a listener has to be able to recognize that even when it's stretched into a totally different form than initially presented even if this recognition only happens subconsciously our first example of this motif being used in game comes in the game's intro cinematic where it's plunked out almost as an afterthought high up on the piano as the player character arrives at hallo nest [Music] [Music] [Music] okay so if this is a light motif then what does it represent the main character I mean it's called hallow night so does it represent the hollow night himself kind of yes to both my theory is that this light motif is used to represent not just the literal hollow night but the vessels beings created by The Pale King and filled with void in his attempts to create a pure vessel that could contain the radiance that had been spreading its infection all across colonists our hero called the night officially is one of these vessels as as the hollow night who was decided to be pure enough to successfully contain the radiance well okay well that turned out besides the intro cutscene the hollow night late motif is used a couple times throughout the environment music which I attribute to us following around the main character through these environments this reasoning is a little shaky admittedly so let's check out some much stronger evidence for my vessel theory the broken vessel is a corpse of one of these vessels found in the ancient basin coming upon it its reanimated by the infection to try and defeat the night foreshadowing the fight with the hollow Knight at the end of the game the broken vessels theme is really interesting because the opening motif from the hollow night theme is straightened out into a marching quarter note rhythm and used as a baseline ostinato throughout the track when the melody comes in we get the full vessel light motif only with the first phrase squished together to fit an extra leading tone resolution to the tonic at the end [Music] [Music] with basically the same melody the same peddled tonic minor chord and a similar enough instrumentation you can see a massive difference in emotional tone between this theme and the original the extremely low register of the piece as a whole the plotting staccato bassline and the rhythmic triplet accompaniment reminiscent of Gustav Holt's Mars from the planets all add up to this feeling of grim resignation as the night gears up to battle one of his fallen brethren the dream version of this boss even has his name changed from broken vessel to lost kin I think the addition of the leading tone resolution to the tonic in this melody lends to this more straightforward serious attitude as opposed to the ethereal sound of the originals sitting on the second of the key at this point in the melody there's another boss theme that makes use of these light motifs but achieves a very different kind of effect the false Knight theme gives us the kind of bombastic and intense music you'd expect from a typical boss encounter with time signature shifts frequent modulations and a powerful up-tempo rolling bassline underpinning the whole thing it's also one of the most faithful adaptations of the original hollow night theme you can find in the soundtrack using the first three phrases of the melody as well as the accompaniment figure we outlined earlier the accompaniment pattern is squished together from four bars of a slow three four two two bars of a quick 6/8 and modified with a flat second scale degree replacing the second in the final bar completely changing the originals pensive tone into the relentless high-energy attitude that you'd want to accompany in exciting boss battle this figure keeps churning underneath as a somber string melody floats over top taking the hollow night theme stretching each phrase out over four bars rather than two and removing all excess notes and rhythms to make it as simple as possible to contrast the frenzied base part happening below [Applause] [Music] now if you're deep in the hollow night lore you might be thinking the first night isn't a vessel your theory is trash and you'd be right but the false light theme doesn't just play over the false night boss fight but one other boss fight as well The Watcher nights neither of these bosses are vessels but they're both empty suits of armor being manipulated by a separate party a wimpy grub and these infected flies respectively this makes them quite literally hollow nights this doesn't make them vessels in the official sense of the word but so far all of these characters are hollow nights in the general sense so the name of the original theme still works although this might just be Christopher Larkin being cheeky with his light motifs the final boss theme that we see make use of the hollow night motif should come as no surprise the sealed vessel theme scoring the battle with the hollow Knight himself the music in this fight is a truly masterful conclusion to the hollow Knights story combining the bombastic thrill and intensity of battle with a poignant reflection much like the false Knight theme the whole night motif is stretched out into long and slow phrases to contrast an accompanying frenzied string part this two-part sixteenth-note line jaggedly outlines a harmonic minor sound on our tonic a minor chord however instead of sounding like your typical crazy boss fight theme this piece also retains a serious quality reminiscent of the broken vessel theme we heard before I attribute this to the doubling of the melody in the bass part even with the swirling hectic string runs going on around it granting the music with these long slow bass notes playing this solemn melody colors the whole piece with this kind of grave tone [Music] I love that Markham used these motifs in such a simple or a pure form like this on their own they're pretty much as devoid of personality as a melody can be this reflects the hollow knight's purity as a vessel being chosen to contain the radiance for being completely empty in the pale Kings own words no mind to think no will to break no voice to cry suffering and this brings us to the second phase of the fight after a certain point the hollow Knight begins to stab himself with his nail and the music completely shifts the chaotic string runs of the first phrase are replaced with these slow string courts taking the first three notes of the hollow neck motif and cutting them off with a return to the tonic refusing to let the full melody play out this combined with the uneven eleven bar length of the loop makes it feel like the melody is trapped in place playing out a cycle that is destined to repeat itself [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] besides the huge tonal shift from the previous section some players heads maybe turn due to recognizing this theme the music as well as The Pale Kings quote from earlier comes from an optional section of the game named the birthplace sequence traveling down to the bottom of the abyss and finding the hollow Knights birthplace triggers a flashback sequence involving the player climbing back up out of the abyss to the pale Kings now famous quote arriving at the top just in time to see The Pale King and a young Hollow Knight leave the abyss together the music scouring the section is the same as the second phase of the titular bossfights theme I'll be it structured a little differently where the birthplace equinox with a choir singing a harmonized version of this stuck in place melody adding an upper string line as the night reaches a certain point in his ascent the hollow night boss version starts with a string trio arrangement of the same theme then slowly adds layers as you whittle down his health including the same upper string part and choral pads we heard in the birthplace sequence [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] the same theme appears again in the path of pain the notoriously difficult platforming segment in the white palace the theme evolves in the exact same way as it does in the boss theme as you progress through the challenge leading up to another flashback sequence where we see The Pale King actually show his creation a little bit of affection okay so when doing research for this video I came across a debate as to whether the hollow Knight stabs himself at this point in the fight to try and damage the infection inside of him thereby helping the player to feed him or if he was opening up parts of his body for more infection to spill out thereby making himself stronger the use of the birthplace and path of pain music here makes me think the correct answer is the former calling back to music used in multiple situations as meant to tie these situations together and having this theme come in during both of the hollow nights flashback sequences found in the game make it feel like the hollow Knight is remembering his past at this point in the battle maybe even remembering his fondness for The Pale King and his duty to protect hallow nest this is the whole reason why the hollow Knight failed to contain the radiance in the first place his remembering the events of his past and acting according to it proves that he does not in fact have no mind to think or know will to break the impurity of the hollow Knight is what kept him from being the perfect vessel as much as The Pale King liked to think that he was so him stabbing himself here must be his final attempt to help the player stave off the infection for good regardless of the narrative implications the drastic change of tone in the music creates an effect not unlike that found in Gwynn's theme from Dark Souls contrasting the action on screen with a somber musical accompaniment gives the player the sense that there's more to this tragic character than just a challenge to be overcome even if the details of this tragic backstory aren't clear after defeating the hollow night the final cutscene is scored differently depending on which ending you get the easiest ending titled the hollow Knight entails the player character taking the hollow Knights place as a vessel to contain the infection scored by taking the initial phrase of our hollow Knight motif and building it up to climax on our tonic minor chord [Music] [Music] the second ending sealed siblings plays out basically the same with the addition of Hornet aiding in the fight and being sealed into the black egg temple along with the player with the addition of the pale kings theme that we discussed in my last video playing out over the final tonic minor chord to drive home hornets sacrifice the game's true ending dream no more involves diving inside the hollow knight's mind and defeating the source of the infection itself as a secret second final boss and has my favorite music of the three we get a longer cutscene showing the void draining from the hollow Knights chamber scored with the exact same musical cue that accompanied the game's intro cinematic [Music] hornet wakes up to see the night's shattered helmet on the ground and the pale kingston comes in alongside the main hollow night theme weaved together as counter lines this moves off into a scene of the siblings in the abyss remnants of failed vessel experiments all disappearing as the music moves on to the birthplace or hollow night phase 2 theme only this time the melody continues past the first four notes resolving to the tonic and providing the vessels and by extension the hollow Knight himself with some long-awaited closure [Music] [Music] beautiful well I hope you enjoyed the series on holiday I really enjoyed working on it because a lot of these musical cues went totally over my head when I first played the game and getting the chance to explore the soundtrack seriously revealed a lot more depth than I had initially thought was there as always if you'd like to support the channel you can check out my patreon here follow me on Twitter here or consider buying a t-shirt here we're kind of running out so this might be the last time I plug this shirt so if you're on the fence go get one thanks so much for sticking with me through this series and I hope to see you all next time [Music] you

Channel: 8-bit Music Theory

Views: 386,432

Rating: 4.9884081 out of 5

Keywords: Hollow Knight, Christopher Larkin, Hollow Knight music, indie game soundtrack, how to write game music, atmospheric music, motivic development, leitmotif, boss fight music, music theory lesson, vgm, video game music theory, Pale King, False Knight Theme, Watcher Knight music, Hollow Knight boss theme, Broken Vessel theme, 8-bit Music Theory

Id: 5IZ6ObjdkPA

Length: 18min 15sec (1095 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 16 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/Kamikaze28]

Only the "Basic Endings" are discussed in this video, so neither of the Godmaster Endings.