This beautiful theme (played on horn with just violins accompanying) displays a number of important Williams fingerprints. Notice that the music is triadic but highly chromatic. Even though each chord sounds familiar they are used in unfamiliar combinations, often blurring the sense of key. See below for orchestral score.

• Modal mixture – we are in D major but every time Williams arrives on IV he borrows the minor version of this chord (G minor)
• Progression by third – Williams often uses a tried and trusted Romantic technique of moving between chords a third apart. Sometimes these are diatonic progressions and sometimes they are chromatic. You can see this in
  • bars 4-5: iv – bII (Gm to Eb)
  • bar 6: V-vii (A to C#)
  • bars 8-9: bVI – iv (Bb to G)
• Semitone shifts – in bar 7 Williams shifts from a chord ii (with a sharpened third) to flat chord ii (E major to Eb minor). Notice how he then moves between chords that are in this more flat region before shifting back properly into D major at the end.

Click to play excerpt

---

Full score