What is it about those 4 notes?

#1

What is it about those 4 notes?

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

#2

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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

Maybe you just think too much.

#3

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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

"Maybe you just think too much."

Nope...that's surely not it.

#4

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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.:)

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There's always room for pathos - and jazz hands.

#5

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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. :)

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Plince! Plince! Nein! T-Rex!!

#6

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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

#7

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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

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

#8

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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!

#9

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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?

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"We like to snark around here. Sometimes we actually talk about theater...but we try not to let that get in our way." - dramamama611

#10

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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

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

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"I really liked the show--Wish I saw Boy's Night...Am I allowed as I am not a boy anymore:)"-duffyny1

#11

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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

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

#12

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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.....

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"Do you know ChrisLovesShows?" "Yes. Why, yes he does!"

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

#13

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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.

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I starred in a short film called Magnetic Personality. Check it out!

#14

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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.

#15

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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.

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But I won't live alone in a house of regret.

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

#16

re: What is it about those 4 notes?

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?)

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RIP glebby <3