Ricey, Shadow of a Star could indeed be balling their eyes out, it might be a problem if their partner notices that they're typing on a video instead of focusing on the activities at hand , but that's between them! 🤣 I derive great amusement from taking people at their word when they make a homophone error 🤭
Poor Eliza, she just isn't listened to. She asked for he loved ones to stay alive, Alexander, Philip, Angelica, AND PEGGY die before her. She asked for Hamilton to take a break, instead, he cheated on her. She asked Hamilton to go back to bed; He didn't. Yeah, I might've missed some. Poor Eliza. She was too helpless to do anything.
@@andymitchell2146 Their family went upstate to visit Philip Schuyler, Angelica’s and Eliza’s father. Hamilton stayed and he cheated on Eliza, he hid it for several years and revealing it in the Reynolds Pamphlet. So yes, he did cheat.
My mind is literally blown. Lin is a musical genius; there's so much thought put into these songs I can't even...! Thank you so much for doing this series and explaining!
Its not what we did. Its what The Little Mermaid did. According to Lin himself, Disney's The Little Mermaid inspired him to be a songwriter and singer.
22 years of reluctant piano lessons---and Hamilton is the first musical collection that actually caught my imagination! Even before your explanation, I had started to catch the chord progressions and how they were interconnected melodically. So much of Hamilton is technically evocative. I've been able to learn scores easily, just because I can hear the melody and bass line as clearly as I can see color. Hamilton is a joy to play.
As someone who struggles to understand the language of music, this video was absolutely fascinating to me - it was exciting to see the music analysed and explained as these are things I never would have noticed from simple listening to the tracks. You're very talented - thankyou for your video essays!! x
My mum doesn't really like Hamilton but since she's a music teacher, I showed her this video and I'm gonna show her the rest at some point too but my mission to get my mum into Hamilton has begun well so thank you!
I honestly do not understand even half of the super technical musical theory,,,, stuff, but jfc I am sHOOK and now very intensely wish to study how music works, ah! I find this whole series to be incredibly inspiring and amazing, it must be very exhaustive and minute work, please keep it up!
your analysis is incredibly impressive. I studied music theory a bit in college (initially was going to major in piano performance then switched) and I truly wish we had resources like this back then. keep it up man you are amazing!
p.s. I'll also mention really quick that I went to college with LMM, he was a year ahead of me at Wesleyan. I didn't know him but now I have to wonder how much music theory he studied there ;)
I wonder what it's like to be you and listen to this stuff with all this musical understanding oozing through your mind. Instantly knowing what's a major and minor chord, or an augmented flat VI with a sharp G7 in the bass, all the while seeing how this tiny part of a song connects to all these other songs. It's mindblowing!
Holy shit, I didn't think that you could ever top your previous videos, but this one absolutely blows them out of the park. The in-depth explanations of the technical aspects of the music were clear, easy to follow and very much appealed to music theory nerds like me; the comparison and demonstration of similar motifs in other pieces of music was an absolutely brilliant way of emphasizing your point and making the motif easier to distinguish, and the musical connections you drew between different tracks in Hamilton were simply ingenious and I seriously don't understand how your ears are so well trained that you can pick out such subtleties and explain them so cleverly. Definitely one of the highest quality channels on RU-vid. Please keep doing what you're doing :D
He couldn't do what the music was telling him to he couldn't stay alive ..... setting us up for a tragedy .....*heart breaks*...... HEY! THANKS FOR WATCHING THE VIDEO!
Whenever I heard those strings at the end of say no to this, I have always thought it was mourning the man that Alexander used to be, now I know why. This video series is amazing!!!
The stay alive theme is in guns and ships if you listen close Lafayette is rapping about hamilton and when he is saying "you gotta put some thought into the letter but the sooner the better to get your right hand man back"
I know this wasn’t even you analysing the music but when the shot sound went during the intro it was interesting. I’ve never seen the Hamilton ‘logo’ as him shooting the sky.
The stay alive theme also kind of appear in "you'll be back" and other King George variations; in which the order of the chord progressions are inverted altered and changed to major key, at least that's what it sounded like. It can possibly represent how King George III is a constant threat to the revolution, but also because he's royalty and his "joyful" nature his songs are ironically lively, in contrast to the very obsessive and narcissistic lyrics. I might be wrong but I really hope you see this, these videos literally changed my view on Lin's Genius, thank you so much
I remember watching this in 2017, I was at the peak of my Hamilton phase and learning to play the keyboard. I barely got the point he was making melodicaly, but rewatching this now that I know a bit more about music theory just feels so right, I'm gonna binge watch this series all over again, thank you so much for making this
This is weird and complicated and makes perfect sense??? I feel like I shouldn't get it, having no real musical training, but it also seems... almost intuitive? Very well done.
I just noticed something. When he was explain how the Stay Alive progression went 5th to 5th augmented, then 6th, then back to 5th augmented, I was thinking about where I've hear it before. Then, it hit me. "(5th) I haven't slept in a week. I was weak. I was awake. (to 5th augmented) You've never seen a bastard orphan more in need of a break. (to 6th) Longing for Angelica, missing my wife...." But, after that, it goes into a 7th, instead of returning back to a 5th augmented. Maybe, that symbolizes how Hamilton knew he was heading into danger with Maria Reynolds(Like war, for Hamilton. Or, for James Bond....well, James Bond), but decided to keep going with Washington, or anyone else, not there to warn him. Or how it sucked him in (quite literally). EDIT: I wrote this before knowing he discussed it in the video. Dammit. This is why you don't comment before watching the full video.
Just discovered your videos and "the world will never be the same." I don't know a thing about music but your videos are so well made that I feel like I almost understand them. Keep up the amazing work, it is appreciated.
Despite the fact I've listened to the show about a hundred times and was fortunate enough to see it in-person, your videos make me feel like I've only discovered ~5% of the story of the music itself. Well done again with this one, thank you.
Damn, you're good. You have validated everything I've been thinking about through hundreds of listenings of this brilliant work. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I feel like sitting down everyone I know and making these videos mandatory watching, so they'll quit rolling their eyes every time I try to explain these things.
I never write comments on RU-vid videos, but I just had to. This must have taken so much time and was honestly one of the most in depth videos I have ever seen, the connections to other themes was phenomenal and I was astounded by the numerous connections you were able to find. As a non-music theory person, this video was so clear and still so interesting. Keep up the fantastic work!!
I've listened to Hamilton so many times, but I still can't pull the music apart in any meaningful way. Like, in the clip of One Last Time you played, I could sort of feel a tonal difference, but it's just part of a whole. I can't even pick out the notes that matter to the rest. When you differentiated whatever the hell the part you're picking out is called from the melody, I was genuinely surprised to learn that there was a difference. I think I'm tone deaf.
I just watched Hamilton for the first time last Friday on Disney+. I've seen the poster for years. But I am just now realizing that the pose on it is him shooting up towards the sky during the dual 🤦🏽♀️ I'm the slowest person on Earth
So when you started this series I had never had a music theory class in my life but now I'm in the middle of my first class and it amazes me how much my thought process has changed when watching these videos now.
This video series is such a JOY to watch and listen. I'm a musical layman, and I just LOVE your explanations. Thank you for what you do! Your explanations just help bring me closer to a musical that I enjoy so much.
The 'Say No To This' chord progression also appears in Maybe This Time from Cabaret ALSO written by Kander and Ebb also about unrequited love (in a sense) but where the protagonist is hopeful that the outcome will be successful. You could see how this could be sung from the perspective of Maria Reynolds and links in super well to the theory behind the use of the chord progression.
I'm barely music literate, but I enjoy the way you trace themes through different songs in Hamilton! You do a great job of flushing everything out in such a way that even a non-music-nerd can sort of follow along.
He forgot to mention that in the beginning of Stay Alive there is a gun shot and a faint whooping sound. That’s the sound of a British soldier shooting at Hamilton in the war and barely missing him...
This was great, as were all the other videos. I love learning how the music theory establishes the themes and moods throughout Hamilton. I would have enjoyed it more if you made it shorter by cutting off the fat (went too long on stuff not directly pertaining to Hamilton such as the elaborations on James Bond and Chicago).
Two more songs with both the Bond chord movement as well as some serious longing for the burning flames of youth and love: Brazil ("Aquarela do Brasil"), and Begin the Beguine. Great study of this musical motif.
Idk if it's enough to generate a whole video, but the chord progression at the very end of "that would be enough" and the beginning chord progressions in "it's quiet uptown" and "best of wives and best of women" is significant, almost as if it underscores alex and eliza's marriage bc all three songs are about it. I'm sure you caught this too, yeah? :)
I would like to mention, that song "the 10 dual commandments" has the same theme Philip has. The theme is the music you hear as: 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 And as: 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 when Philip learns piano with Eliza. The theme is foreshadowing what will happen to Philip in the future and it comes back again with Philip singing it before he dies.
I cover all of that in my 10 Duel Commandments video. And believe me, the connections go deeper than that too: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-1qXsFs2ywMo.html
These videos just get better and better, keep up the good work! I noticed you chose to use an echo effect at the end of phrases when you play the quotes from the songs. I personally found it a bit loud and jarring, I'd consider instead using a fade out or something. But your choice :) Great job!
@@HowardHoMusic you do an excellent Job of breaking down this musical would be great to see you do some of the big famous ones like Phantom, Les Miz, Wicked, miss saigon etc. It is great to see someone teaching people how musicals work they way you are here. showing them that it is not just a load of random songs stuck into a play and that they are all linked some how and linked to the character. I remember going to see Wicked last year with my fiance. and she wondered why i had a little laugh when i heard Elphaba's (unlimited) theme in her songs. and i had to explain to my fiance when she asked why i laughed. that the theme was basically some where over the rainbow with slight change in the rhythm
Speculation about the other motifs (colour-coding taken from 1:12 and 1:52 of the Burr motif video; confirm or deny if you want to but I don't really give a fuck; I am not a music scientist) - Yellow: pretty obvious; all the Story of Tonight iterations - Orange: also pretty obvious; everyone knows Yorktown and Hurricane have v similar piano - Dark blue: The James Reynolds letter? - Green: It looks like the duel/counting motif, but then what's it doing in Cabinet Battle 1? - Grey: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ idk
The 5-5+-6 chord structure is also in the Green Day song “Last Night On Earth” from the American Idiot musical (originally from 21st Century Breakdown), I just really like it so I had to share. It’s also about a long distance relationship using letters, like Hamilton and Eliza communicate, especially during the part of the musical where Say No To This is sung, while Eliza is away on vacation
//non hamilton related tho but upon hearing the chord pregression of the 5th, 5th+, 6th, and m7th i couldn't stop hearing "We'll Meet Again" (obvious gravity falls dork here) and thought that's more or less a joyful sounding song of farewell, it prompts the idea of pleading to remember me while im away and to keep hoping i might return even though I probably won't (due to war). and it also prob has an undertone of we'll meet again after death so ye idk i thought of pointing it out
I love these so much! They perfectly sum up and capture why I love musical theatre so much: how clever and thought out they are, appealing to your emotions subconsciously. I love it! Amazing videos!!
All your videos are so intelligent and interesting, absolutely love all the work and effort you so obviously put into each of them, keep up the good work!
Howard, please keep this series of videos coming. I've learned more music theory from your analysis than from the few lessons I've ever had, and enjoyed it *far* more! And you've helped me appreciate Miranda's genius on a whole new level.
Hi!? Has Lin ever been in touch with you about your theory? I, for one, think your analysis is genius and for the layperson it opens a door to a veritable treasure trove to which I otherwise would never have access.
All of them are fascinating. Can I ask where you were trained? (Or is that too personal maybe). I suppose you teach music theory somewhere. Did you post his reply?
