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"The victory of something that shouldn't have won" is the best description of what this theme feels like

I’ve once heard this track being described as “a sunrise in hell” and it fits. It has an evil, yet triumphant feel to it. Hereditary has become one of my favorite horror movies so thank you!

This has the kind of terrifying feel that the THX theme does for whatever reason. It's triumphant but grows louder and louder into an unsettling cacophony that has weirdness in it due to the unusual textures and sporadic dissonance.

You're so right, this theme does feel happy, triumphant even. Evil prevails just as it was meant to. There was never a way out for this family. I've watched this movie exactly once and it's stayed with me for years. Truly disturbing and one I'll never watch again.

It's so triumphant. It's a fanfare for demons. stetson is brilliant and underrated.

It's disturbingly joyous, but it's not our joy the music is highlighting. I'm so happy you did a dive into this piece, it's absolutely phenomenal.

That cacophony is exactly that; where you’re playing bright and loud but you push even further beyond so much so that it turns crass and you get that vibrating distortion of sound. It’s taking what should be a triumphant fanfare and twisting it to something distorted which gives off that eerie and disturbing sensation of “Oh no, we’ve gone too far”

Any horror movie can be scary, but nothing is more disturbing than a horror movie that's happy about what it is.

I noticed Ari Aster likes to have bright sounding OSTs in his movies, especially if they're horror/thrillers. Another example is Bobby Krlic's Fire Temple from Midsommar. If you listen to this without the context of the movie, you wouldn't think it was a horror flick. Amazing.

When I first watched this movie, I was with friends and the ending to me felt warm, cozy, and comforting, and my friends all called me a psychopath saying it was clearly a horrific ending. And while I clearly could identify it as disturbing it still had those comforting qualities and I had just attributed them to the lighting and set design of the tree house, but now I know there was that specific intent with the score as well. Absolutely brilliant

If you look at Paimons lore the sounds used in this correlate to his arrival. Like trumpets blowing and cymbals crashing. It's really a masterpiece

Aster has this way of making you feel safe in such horrific situations with his use of bright beautiful colors and soothing musical scores. He makes you feel as though things are alright as the world crashes and burns around you. It’s so astounding and wonderful and makes me love his work so much.

A common element between that score and the Midsommar score is the slow but methodical dancing around the tonic underpinned by a tonic drone. Gives such a sense of inevitably. That what happened was always going to happen, and the characters were merely there to bear witness to their fate. Truly haunting.

I had the pleasure of listening to Philip Glass talk about movie scoring years ago. He had scored a horror movie - I forget which one - and we watched the scene where someone is murdered. But Glass chose to score it using a delicate tune rather than a cacophonous mess and his comment for why he did this still rings in my head. Something like: by scoring something calming while the viewer is watching something horrific, you as a composer are forcing the viewer to travel emotionally between these two states. The wider the chasm, the more difficult the journey but also the more memorable.

It feels like looking at the horizon during a sunrise, but the sun is a vibrant purple. Gorgeous, but incredibly terrifying.

"He is described as a man riding a Dromedary camel, preceded by men playing loud music (particularly trumpets), as well as cymbals". This score is defiantly inspired by this quote from the lore regarding the demon Paimen.

Db major is my favorite key. It just sounds so magnificent and ethereal and honestly finding out the theme is written in that key makes perfect sense for this film.

This movie was so disturbing that, even after not watching it in a couple years, just the few scenes and talking about the music are enough to tighten my chest and raise my heart rate. What a great terrifying movie and score.

Hereditary, Midsommar, and Beau is Afraid are three of the greatest mindf**k horror movies ever made. Ari is a legitimate genius.

IDK if Ari Aster did this intentionally but perhaps what makes the unnaturally happy theme most disturbing to me is WHY it sounds so happy. In various books on demons such as the Ars Goetia and Dictionnare Infernal is that the arrival of the kings of Hell (such as Paimon in the movie) are often heralded by trumpet fanfare. Its a triumphant theme, but it’s a triumph for the King Paimon. Absolutely brilliant.

I am so incredibly delighted to see Hereditary analyzed by Charles… easily the most disturbing and emotionally damaging movie I have ever seen, and a big part of that is the disconnect between the visuals and the music. The juxtaposition is so strong and it just does something to me that no other film has ever made me feel.

By far….. the scariest movie I have ever watched in my damn life. No comic relief, very serious themes, and dark atmosphere of a family falling apart. Scared the absolute shit out of me, and I don’t even scare that easily.

Hereditary is such a good horror film where it's not just jumpscares, but also mystery in it. The clicking that Peter does tells me that Charlie was already possessed by Paimon since the beginning, since Paimon does the clicking.

in a way using a triumphant theme for a terrifying ending makes it seem all the more hopeless, since usually when you hear this in movies you think they day has definitely been won by the protagonists and there’s nothing the antagonists can do to change that. this theme sounds like a triumphant and definite victory. it sounds so COMPLETE.

Emotional dissonance is one of the most common techniques in horror. For example; kids singing, amusement parks, parties, camping, the ocean. Things our brains associate with fun and happiness but twisted into something scary.

Knowing Colin Stetson style of playing the saxophone, that "inter-voice movement" you called our attention to; Stetson is playing the arpeggio as he is also singing through the saxophone... At the same time! He's a master of making the saxophone sound huge and immersive. I encourage everyone to look up Stetsons live videos. Unreal.

That click goes way...way beyond just being a tick. Ari Aster really has a near devoted appreciation to the Ars Goetia and other grimoires. Truly inspiring.

Your enthusiasm for this score reminds me of how emotional my own response was when I first saw Hereditary. What I found most amusing was that Aster chose to use the old Judy Collins chestnut, Both Sides Now, for the end titles, serving as a sort of palette cleanser; a trick he repeated for Midsommar with Frankie Valli's The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore.

The scratchiness of the brass in the one part makes the "happy" into "horrifying" but in an "epic" way also.

The best description I've ever seen of this song was the time someone described it as sounding like "sunrise in Hell." Especially given I experience sound-color synesthesia, so to me, those big bands of sound, those four notes you talk about here, are vivid bands of golden orange and red. Also though, I wanna talk about my FAVORITE thing about this track, which is the fact that narratively, it tells us that our perspective as the audience has changed. Before, when we followed the living family, the soundtrack was suitably dark and nightmarish... but after Peter's death and rebirth, we get that shift to that warm, triumphant theme, and that confirms for us immediately that we aren't following the family anymore, because none of them are left to follow. We see the finale from the perspective of the cult celebrating their glorious victory. Yes, the fear is over... because those who were afraid are all dead.

I think there were some significant things left unexamined here by not talking about the microtonality of the portmanteau that was used, and the unique timbres Stetson achieves by circular breathing and drone singing while playing saxophones and clarinets. Those are keys to making an otherwise 'happy' set of notes sound intensely creepy.

As an electronic musician who is old beyond taking much pleasure in messing around with VSTs for weird sound effects, I just wanted to thank you and 12 tone for teaching me so much about how I can conjure just as much dynamics through learning just a bit of music theory and doing some unexpected things with it. This score is a perfect example...

Still gives me chills. The complete terror I felt with this theme at the treehouse scene at the end… good lord. A near perfect horror film.

God I love it when soundtracks/pieces have a sort of sickeningly happy sound to them, like someone's completely content with something they're about to do despite it being dramatically ironic. Thank you so much for covering this, I'll be sure to watch it. Some other exemples of inappropriate bright/happy songs are (SPOILERS AHEAD): Stay from interstellar, where the triumphant yet unknowing chords becomes a dreading cacophony later in the movie when the initial efforts to leave are actively trying to be stopped. I wanna say the hunger games movies soundtrack might have this type of effect as well in a few songs but don't count me on it I wanna say there's a scene in a movie where a character sacrifices themselves while another character yells at them not to with a laid back happy melody playing, but I can't think of other examples off the top of my head rn

When I first heard it, it gave me a very esoteric feeling. It was strangely familiar. Its almost like I've heard before in another life or in another dimension. The feeling of it is very triumphant and almost holy. Hearing the trumpets and choir, it gave me a feeling of having the secrets of the universe being unlocked to me. I envisioned that this sound is something that would have been heard in Ancient Egypt when the pyramids were still clade in white limestone. Add all these feelings to the movies plot and seeing the crowning of Paimon, a King of Hell, it was very unsettling as if I personally was somehow giving homage to pure evil.

Also noticed a bit of infrasound adding to the feeling of unease (listen to 13:55). It's the notes that exist right on the cusp of what humans are physically able to hear and we've got hereditary memory that tells us to be afraid of those low notes since they often were accompanied by some sort of natural disaster.

I think the subtle tuning of instruments throughout this is a key part of what makes this so creepy - the beginning arpeggios are not all in tune with each other, and there's a few points here where the 'landing' in Db isn't really to the piano-tuned Db. Really dope.

11:45 The instrument used is a bass saxophone!! It's an incredible instrument that Colin uses in a lot of his music but especially in his "New History Warfare" albums as well as his most recent "What we were that what wept for the sea". He is an absolute genius and I highly reccomend checking out ALL of his work!!!!!!

I've never experienced this movie and felt afraid or terrified. Its ending feels oddly satisfying and triumphant. The theme makes me feel bittersweet and almost proud but I don't feel fear and I don't hear fright. It's perfect.

Honestly, moreso than Ave Maria, the beginning of this piece sounds A LOT like the beginning of the Ring Cycle, with those layered, building arpeggios all playing at different times, with varying rhythms. Almost creating a flowy slightly underwater sound. Strangely haunting and beautiful music.

Bro, never stop making these videos please. You're made for it. Your knowledge and exuberance is so captivating.

Major key is so underrated. Just look at Pixar; _all_ their saddest musical moments, in the entire filmography, they're all Major key, every time. "When Somebody Loved Me": Major key. Boo getting her door: Major key Marlin realizing his kid is the only thing he has left in the world after his wife and eggs got massacred: Major key. The UP montage: Major key Joy remembering the sadness in Riley's life as a good thing: Major key. Show me someone who's first impulse is "scary" music for a scary scene and "sad" music for a sad scene and I'll show you someone who lacks imagination. The bitterest tears are cried for something we used to feel happy about.

Not just the notes themselves, but the distortion of the theme makes it sound like something used in an alien movie. Definitely other worldly.

Colin Stetson in all honesty is such an incredible composer and musician. This theme what I’d call hauntingly beautiful and it forces you to pay attention, even if you find yourself wanting to look away. If possible I’d like to recommend the trailer music to the upcoming anime of Uzumaki, the man does some incredible things with the sax, and for me it has a similar vibe to the hauntingly beautiful music of Hereditary. Highly recommend it! Looking forward to the next upcoming videos!

Thank you. This is why it boggles my mind when people say they hated this movie or that it’s not scary (that’s subjective i guess); because not only were the tools used so effectively, the effect achieved from those tools feels so sophisticatef and of course downright scary. It’s a new kind of scary in media that makes Aster such a great director from the get go.

5 notes, it's that last note going home that's the killer, makes it epic and that buzzing synth sounds makes it sound like demonic trumpets.

The thing is that this theme blends into the final scene so good. A demon in normal horror movies look monstrous and even muscular and animalistic, but in Hereditary it goes beyond that and there the demonic is just like Divine. demonic is just otherworldly as the abrahamic god (with some middle eastern and roman flavours) differing only in the intentions. So it deserves such a regal music but it must sound essentially scary to us.

I hear that intro as a moment of subtle tune up.. like different members of wind section testing their instruments.. arpeggios to check tuning which develops into the music

I love that Stetson made the theme in Db, a half-step up from middle C, just a hair off from TRULY settling us into something comforting. And then the major line cliche before final end! So, so good. So simple. So chilling.

I've never seen this movie and I don't intend to because I don't do horror movies, but just this bit of music makes my soundtrack hungry brain drool and gives me waves of goosebumps.

The intro really throws backroom vibes especially with the imagery of the sideways tree house, adding this oddly familiar feeling while looking at something that absolutely should not make any sense but somehow does with the music.

Just the fact that such a grand, major key is sooo distorted says how happy everyone in the situation is but how awfully disturbed we feel about it

I think it also has to do with context. Sometimes nursery rhymes can be made to sound scary even if in the major scale if slowed down and with an echo added. Similar with carnival music. It almost lends an eerie feeling that things are too saccharine and something is "off" Another example would be in the "Courage The Cowardly Dog," cartoon episode with that weird and insane character named Fred. There was a motif that kept playing in the background that was like a carnival tune in a Lydian mode in some parts, especially towards the end where it was sung slightly out of tune. kzfaq.info/get/bejne/qqyoY89n16m2pWw.htmlsi=egIWXxAZ9IYC5rKI Perhaps it acts as a sort of musical equivalent of an "uncanny valley effect."

It really overtakes you how the music is just a pure celebration of tonality. I really couldn't stop talking about the music in this movie for a while after I saw it. Especially because I didn't expect Colin Stetson, but I recognized him when I heard the most incredible saxophone technique I've ever heard.

This is one of my favorite movies that I've never seen and probably never will. It's a masterpiece, and I'm happy to enjoy its elements by proxy, so thank you for helping me appreciate the music and how it enhances the movie that much more.

This is the most scary and disturbing movie to me, and the music played such a huge part of it. All your senses are taken for a horrifying ride. I still haven't been able to re-watch it.

Some of the most effective and affective horror/suspense music is simple. It is stripped down to its core. This is a beautiful example of that. Much like the Jaws theme, it is able to convey the message without the extras which would otherwise detract from the film. Genius

Opening track from 2:57 DEFINITELY sounds more like Wagner’s Das Rheingold, WWV 86A: Vorspiel than it does Ave Maria imo. Also a cool connection to themes of birth. Super encourage a listen, I think this is more what the film composer was going for

I’m SO GLAD you are discussing this! I always felt this scene has a celestial vibe to it, which is just SO WEIRD! What a great film and film score.

Theres actually a lot to this. The demon Paimon that gets reborn in a bibllical context qoute "He hath a great Voice, and roareth at his first coming, and his speech is such that the Magician cannot well understand unless he can compel him." and you have that deep vocal rumble that appears. The trumpets? And how it escalates into a cacophony? If you summon Paimon, he shows up with an entourage of musicians, for no other apparent reason than because he can "There goeth before him also an Host of Spirits, like Men with Trumpets and well sounding Cymbals, and all other sorts of Musical Instruments.

One thing you missed out is how the demon Paimon, who is being summoned in the scene, always travels with a host of spirits and demons playing trumpets and cymbals. One of his greatest powers is his knowledge, specifically his knowledge of the arts. He has a great voice and roars when he arrives. All of these descriptions are from an ancient grimoire called "The Lesser Key of Solomon" and the theme seems to have been composed in order to perfectly match these conditions.

UGH this made my choral nerd brain BUZZ so happily! THE DETAIL LEVEL IN THIS SCORE IS LIKE A GOURMET FEAST OF TRIUMPH AND I AM DEVOURING EVERY ATOM!!

The reason why I think it’s so disturbing is that it’s so triumphant but something isn’t quite right like it also feels eerie somehow. the trumpet and sax sounds also make sense because it’s meant to be a rebirth of the demon King Paimon (hence the name of the piece being reborn) and it’s described that Paimon would be accompanied by trumpets also bells I think which is why we can hear some bells and some low vocal sounds which is terrifying. also the clicking sound that he makes shows that he is possessed because Charlie was always making the clicking sound as well because Paimon rode on a camel and this is because Charlie was a vessel for Paimon before Peter became Paimon at the very end

I’m not even a horror fan (I couldn’t even look at the footage lol) but I must say, this theme is FANTASTIC!! It definitely has a very weird, off putting vibe. The composer is brilliant!!

This score is one of the most unique scores in recent times. It should've been recognized more, but I'm glad you're showing it some love.

Happy to see someone who feels this way. Your reaction to the opening notes is exactly how I feel

This is officially my new favorite video on youtube. Everything from the editing to the explanation to the topic to your lovely enthusiasm makes this a masterpiece that I never want to stop watching. Thank you

Colin Stetson's solo work is absolutely incredible. He is an absolute machine with what he does. I highly recommend reacting to some of his live performances.

It's amazing what a simple ... bastardization (? in a good way, of course) of a single note can do to signal to the audience how they're supposed to view a scene, like the detuned G# going sharp. Just a subtle change, a subtle cue that registers to the ears and brain sort of subconsciously. Genius stuff.

This is what I always thought the “Entry of the Gods into Valhalla” by Wagner should have sounded like. Terrifying, beautiful, and magnificent.

I wrote a paper on Colin Stetson for a seminar in college and the most impressive thing about his music is that most sounds you hear are just him on a wind instrument. That kinda distorted feeling is, from what I recall, just the mics he uses for recording (typically contact mics), his embouchure, and the occasional multiphonics he plays on his instruments. Those notes dancing around that arpeggio come from him singing into the instrument WHILE playing WHILE circular breathing. He is a freak of nature in the best way and I'm glad people can appreciate the beauty of his work without knowing all the extended techniques he employs.

Another counter intuitive reason that it's so scary is that the soundtrack for the whole movie before this point has been utterly devoid of any harmonic cadence, or tonal theme. Then suddenly this almost triumphant reveille-like motif just bursts through. But the reason for the triumph is horribly twisted.

Literally just watched this last night and couldn't stop remarking on how good the score/ambient music is.

The cool thing about that intro with the clarinets is that it’s almost exactly the same as the intro to “Mothers and Daughters” earlier in the movie when Annie tells Charlie goodnight after her mother’s funeral. In the earlier track, the parts layered over the clarinet typically add a dissonant voice, where the new voices in “Reborn” all build with consonance until that climactic melody rings through everything else, almost like the score is saying that things have been set right by the end of the movie.

An amazing piece of advice my music teacher gave me was: every instrument has a comfortable range or a 'pleasant' way to be played. If you push the range or timbre to its limits, you can play the happiest notes and still feel the strain and tension

You should do Fire Temple from Midsommar. Incredibly cinematic and visual piece.

This is my first time watching your videos but I already can’t help but subscribe-I loved everything about this! I’m not a music person so I don’t know any of the terms or the phrases for stuff, but I love movie scores. They’re like another layer to the films, to help tell the stories we watch. Your enthusiasm and passion and excitement are contagious, I loved listening to you explain the theme to one of my favorite movies

I think the incorporation of the instrument is a very genius addition of details about Paimon’s demons instruments playing when he’s introduced inside the book of Ars Goetia.

Movie summaries from a musical perspective is ingenious! Please keep these up

Colin Stetson is my favorite composer of all time. Thank you for covering him and his work!!

I highly recommend the harmonic series too, amazing way of easing from bright harmony into something weird. I also recommend playing wholetone OVER it, keeping the intervals at any given moment and how they transition in mind. Start out with just the 1st, 2nd and third degrees, bring in the minor 7th (Implies dominant) or tritone (Implies lydian), then the tritone or minor 7th and sharp 5th if you also wanna kinda unravel the weirdness gradually there, for example. You can also start a harmonic series from what was previously a harmonic!

I love it. It forces you to fight against yourself feeling sense of comfort for just long enough before resolving with the discomfort you should feel in the scene.

The theme truly has the power to create the very environment it promises to deliver, like it really does holds all of it's wierdness in the right places if that makes sense, all in all it just makes you feel so upbeat of an uprising at wrong moments along with utterly confusing visuals untill it uncannily makes sense....like it's not supposed to, but does, it does an absolutely awesome job with it's high key notes at the end, the noise, the stretch, just amazing

There's also something to be said for the way the strings are played. Despite playing a "happy" series of notes, their attack and vibrato sound a little Psycho-ish.

I once listened to this while closely regarding the painting "The Garden of Earthly Delights." It felt like being caught between a dream and a nightmare, and I found myself crying from the macabre beauty of it all. Two masterpieces of art made centuries apart brought together in a colorful symphony of Hellish triumph.

GOOD GOD! that low Db really transforms it too - this was a phenomenal display and explanation, so happy I found your channel!! Binging now!!!

The sound gives me a feeling of bliss, of being somewhere you don't belong, something above you .

The beginning also reminds me a lot of the opening of Das Rheingold by Wagner. A MASSIVE piece of music!

It's 100% the timbre. Play that on a flute in a Disney movie and it'll SLAP.

thank you for deepening my love for this movie, and understanding of the music. phenomenal work and explanation as always!

music like this is just so amazing oh my god. I’ve never been able to find the actual wording for how it makes me feel, which makes it very hard to find songs with the same kind of vibe. It has always made me feel as though something horrible is about to happen. it just makes my heart SINK, and I’m so fascinated by it. Kind of like music played using semitones

Mate I have been putting the last few ideas to work and it's been amazing! Thanks pal, please keep it up!

The theme from Hereditary is like Annihilation’s psychopathic brother

I feel like this is the triumph of evil, like a bastardization of what is supposed to be holy, especially with the story and the placement of the massive fanfare at the end. Genuinely the scariest movie since the exorcist imo.

I love your description and love for music and the emotion behind it though.

Dude your composition choices to analyze are always so so good! I’ve watched your videos for years and it’s really helped me grasp music theory better! I have a request- can you make a video on the song “the cadet leaps” by King Krule? Or another song by him that grabs your attention? There’s a lot of complex stuff happening in his music that I would love a deeper understanding of!

I really enjoy these deep dives into music I would not ordinarily take the time to appreciate much. Also the breadth of Charles' musical knowledge/listening means we get to know about all the intentional references and musical detail which creates the atmosphere and conveys emotion. Great stuff!

Totally dig your enthusiasm and energy here! Beautiful 🙂

I'm so glad you covered this, one of my favorite film scores of all time