What is it about those 4 notes?

[morosco]

Posted: 11/26/04 at 12:48pm

I seem to hear them all the time. It's the first four musical notes you hear:
1) In GYPSY ("I had a dream")
2) In Les Miserables (The oboe at the beginning of "I Dreamed a Dream"
3) In the Dell computer advertisements (Those 4 tones again at the end of the commercials) Updated On: 11/26/04 at 12:48 PM

[Ebonic_Singer]

Posted: 11/26/04 at 12:53pm

Maybe you just think too much.

[morosco]

Posted: 11/26/04 at 12:58pm

"Maybe you just think too much."

Nope...that's surely not it.

[MagicToDo82]

Posted: 11/26/04 at 5:52pm

morosco, let me tell you, i am so glad to hear that someone else recgonized those four notes from the Dell commercials as "I have a dream" from Gypsy~! I've been thinking that for years.:)

[secret-soul]

Posted: 11/26/04 at 8:23pm

shucks, I thought this thread was gonna be about the four ghost notes on the phantom movie website. whatever. :)

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 11/26/04 at 9:10pm

Haha, wow, I never noticed that.

I will now. And they will most definitely haunt me from now on, hooray! Heh.

~Steven

[MichaelCassara]

Posted: 11/26/04 at 9:13pm

Well, don't forget basically the entire score of MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG...

[Unknown User]

Posted: 11/26/04 at 10:27pm

We are currently singing "Chatanooga Choo Choo" in my Beautyshop/Barbershop Choir (i founded at my high school) and the first few notes are exactly like "you'll be swell" in GYPSY's "Everything's Coming Up Roses"... I LOVE IT!

[millie_dillmount]

Posted: 11/26/04 at 10:37pm

Morosco, after you said that I pulled out my Les Mis CD and listened for it. I noticed it also...those 4 notes are more dragged out and slower in Les Mis than in Gypsy. Now I have to watch for the Dell commercial. Is it a specific one or in all of them?

[StateOfJade]

Posted: 11/26/04 at 10:39pm

Wow. Whether or not you have too much time on your hands, you're right! Interesting.

[judy_in_disguise]

Posted: 11/27/04 at 1:04am

It's a 1-4-1-5 progression. And to be honest- I HAVE noticed that before!

[ChrisLovesShows]

Posted: 11/27/04 at 1:14am

I think the notes actually acompany the appearance of the Pentium logo at the end of the Dell (and some other) commercials. So it's really related to more to Pentium than to Dell. I felt that this was important to clear up before we could continue this discussion in earnest. OK, please proceed.....

Updated On: 11/27/04 at 01:14 AM

[~FloweryFriend~]

Posted: 11/27/04 at 4:04am

This just broke my world.



Okay, let me throw a couple at you.
These are my perceptions, not necessarily facts.

1. The Roy Orbison songs "Pretty Woman" and "You Got It" end the same way
2. "I'm Not Afraid of Anything" and "Stars and the Moon" (both from SFANW) have the same repeated melodic phrase at the endings.

[morosco]

Posted: 11/27/04 at 4:10am

Yes ChrisLovesShows...those notes are more closely related to Pentium logo than to Dell but they are always in the same ad nowadays.

[leomaxfrank]

Posted: 11/27/04 at 10:54am

you got it..the infamous 1-4-1-5. it's everywhere. in college we had often discussed this over-used melodic line. interesting. the chord progression 1-4-5 is a standard popular tonal music progression (pleasing to the ear and expected), but the fact that its used as a melody line as well...
you'd be surprised how much more you could find with those notes.

Updated On: 11/27/04 at 10:54 AM

[cturtle]

Posted: 11/29/04 at 6:57pm

a similar 4-note motif is heard in MY FAIR LADY as a seque between the overture and WHY CAN'T THE ENGLISH as the curtain rises. (or am i dreaming that?)