If you've ever watched a movie or played a video game, you've heard musical themes attached to certain characters and places. For example, Star Wars gave us "Leia's Theme." And in The Lord of the Rings, anytime this progression of descending thirds played, we knew something sinister was happening.
I like to assign similar themes to characters and settings in my writing, because I love the way music can ground an image in emotion. If I can convey that same feeling with my words, I know I'm on the right track.
So I create my playlist early and check in with it often throughout a draft--like to make sure my protagonist, Roy, is still that kind, noble, mostly harmless guy with a dark secret just below the surface (as I interpret the main theme from Final Fantasy VII), or that Em's motivation remains driven by a deep sense of longing for something beautiful and out of reach ("Suteki Da Ne," from Final Fantasy X).
(And lest you think I only draw my themes from the Final Fantasy pot, my aging gambler, Lars, who gives characters a taste of the novel world's "old ways" in his vacation resort, got "Fi's Theme" from The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, while the pianist in his employ, Philo, got Michael Nyman's "The Sacrifice" for his own journey nursing old wounds.*)
*You can hear seventeen-year-old me playing it a half-step lower here. In a lot of ways, Philo is basically me.
Aside from sparking ideas for entire novels and getting me into a creative mood, I've found that using musical themes in my writing keeps me emotionally in tune with my work and helps me stay true to the stories I want to tell. Music is my favorite writing tool.
Do any of you writers make a playlist for your stories? What other tools do you use? I'd love to hear about them in the comments!
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