Scary music

Hey, there’s science in this horror movie soundtrack

This is an excerpt from the book Hey, There’s Science In This, available from March 28th. Paid subscribers see the full excerpt below, while free subscribers only get the first part. I will also be talking about this piece (and playing some of the chords mentioned here on violin) during the launch livestream on Wednesday.

Photo by Michał Franczak on Unsplash

Scary movies are far less scary without their soundtrack. EditorRobert Ryang found a very funny way to show this when he entered a competition by the Association of Independent Creative Editors in 2005. This competition asked people to re-cut the trailer for a film so that it became a different genre. Ryang chose the trailer for The Shining. Using clips from the original movie trailer, he added a brand-new voice-over that made the 1980 horror film sound like a sappy and lighthearted family comedy. To top it all off, the trailer ends with the upbeat song “Solsbury Hill” by Peter Gabriel playing over the final clips of the trailer. The cheerful music completely changes the mood of the video.

So, music makes scary movies scary – but what makes scary music so scary in the first place?