Comments on: Diegetic Music, Non-Diegetic Music, and “Source Scoring” https://filmmusicnotes.com/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/ Understanding the Art of Film Music Wed, 19 Feb 2025 17:12:20 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9 By: Mark Richards https://filmmusicnotes.com/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-91608 Wed, 19 Feb 2025 17:12:20 +0000 https://filmmusicnotes.com/2013/04/21/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-91608 In reply to Steve Batcup.

Ha! Great example. I didn’t know that one, but it works so well. It reminds me of The Long Goodbye, where the title song is played in several versions, all spliced seamlessly into one another as the film cuts from character to another, especially when Elliott Gould goes from his car, where we hear a soulful sung, into the supermarket, where it immediately cuts into a “muzak” (elevator music) version without missing a beat. And it does this many times in the opening scene!

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By: Steve Batcup https://filmmusicnotes.com/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-91607 Wed, 19 Feb 2025 16:52:03 +0000 https://filmmusicnotes.com/2013/04/21/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-91607 . Timed to perfection. The effect has been copied many times since.]]> A great comedy example of non-diegetic music transitioning into diegetic music here from Gross Point Blank: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1xoxtDcO08

Hard rock Guns N’ Roses becomes pizzicato elevator style as he walks into the convenience store 😆. Timed to perfection. The effect has been copied many times since.

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By: Mark Richards https://filmmusicnotes.com/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-79084 Thu, 28 Apr 2022 13:49:55 +0000 https://filmmusicnotes.com/2013/04/21/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-79084 In reply to Chris McKnight.

Thanks for your engaging question, Chris! So in Hagen’s definition, the music in source scoring can be heard as diegetic throughout, but it takes on meaning that is usually reserved for non-diegetic music. So in the scene in Drive you mention, the music can always be heard as diegetic. Now I’m not sure whether the music takes on a deeper meaning in that scene – yes, it becomes more prominent, but since I’m not familiar with the film, I don’t know if there’s more significance to that increase in prominence. If there is, it would fall into the category of source scoring. The idea of taking a diegetic song and turning it into a non-diegetic leitmotif I don’t know any common name for, but the distinction between diegetic and non-diegetic is maintained in such a case, whereas in source scoring, it becomes blurred. As for your question about singing diegetically to non-diegetic accompaniment, there is a great discussion about this in Buhler and Neumeyer’s Hearing the Movies, 2nd ed., where they say:

song in a musical generally does not lend itself to strict interpretation in terms of diegetic or nondiegetic. The character seems to know very well that he or she is singing, and thus (espeically with musicals written specifially for the screen rather than close adaptations of stage musicals) the song begins diegetically, just as it normally would in any other narrative film (one very common device in classical Hollywood musicals is to show one or more characters gathered around a piano). As the song progresses, however, nondiegetic orchestral accompaniment enters, replacing the piano. It is this displacement, or dissolve of one accompaniment into another, that [Rick] Altman defines as the audio dissolve.

And they go on to say that “musicals do not maintain the clear separation of diegetic and nondiegetic registers and so cannot rigorously enforce the boundaries of the diegetic world, which seems to constantly dissolve under the force of song.” There’s more too about how musicals being essentially romantic comedies and the songs intensifying the romance to create an idealized world. So basically, musicals don’t play by the same rules as other narrative films!

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By: Chris McKnight https://filmmusicnotes.com/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-79082 Thu, 28 Apr 2022 12:15:05 +0000 https://filmmusicnotes.com/2013/04/21/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-79082 As I teach film studies, the term Source Scoring seems to already exist as a term of that intertwining of Diegetic and Non-diegetic sound. That term is called a “SOUND MIX” or the code switching back and forth as in the scene in DRIVE, when the music of the party goes from music in the scene (muffled or muted) to a larger , more involved playing. Thus, sound scoring to me may instead be the use of a leit motif such as in Zefferelli’s Romeo and Juliet where the sound track involves replaying of the song sung at the party in different ways throughout the film using variations in major and minor tones. I think that may be what source scoring may truly be at it’s heart. Sound Mix is the act of switching, thus source scoring is either a synonym or a deeper meaningful concept of music use and function. That is how I would differentiate that idea. May I instead address a question my students asked: when kids are singing in a scene (diegetic) and a faceless, non-existent accompaniment (background band plays along) that does NOT appear in the scene (non-diegetic , technically), what does one call that background accompaniment that the singers clearly are following or seemingly reacting to in the frame or moment of the film?

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By: Linda Cowles https://filmmusicnotes.com/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-77680 Mon, 12 Apr 2021 21:11:16 +0000 https://filmmusicnotes.com/2013/04/21/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-77680 I have had a question about film music for a long time. Is there a term which means the beginning of a piece of music coinciding exactly with an action in the film, such as the opening of a door exactly on the downbeat of the music, e.g., in “Amadeus” where a door is forced open, beginning Mozart’s Symphony #25?

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By: SRH https://filmmusicnotes.com/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-77277 Sun, 19 Jul 2020 16:23:19 +0000 https://filmmusicnotes.com/2013/04/21/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-77277 A fine parody of source scoring is in the Mel Brooks film, ‘Blazing Saddles’. A scene set in the desert with the Black sheriff riding towards the town of racists has a jazz score which, after a short while, is revealed as being played out there in the desert by the Count Basie Orchestra.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2xYaL_Mheg

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By: Michael Schelle https://filmmusicnotes.com/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-53175 Sat, 05 May 2018 02:29:43 +0000 https://filmmusicnotes.com/2013/04/21/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-53175 Bernard Herrmann’s “piano concerto” at the finale of “Hangover Square” begins as diagetic but becomes non-diegetic –

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By: Sharon Crowley https://filmmusicnotes.com/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-10605 Wed, 05 Mar 2014 06:46:51 +0000 https://filmmusicnotes.com/2013/04/21/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-10605 Another example of this is in the film Children of Men, when Theo (Clive Owen) is riding in his cousin’s Rolls Royce with “The Court of the Crimson King” playing strongly over the top. As the car ride progresses, diegetic sounds start to bleed through the song. Then the car pulls into the garage at the Ark of the Arts and the song is playing over a loudspeaker in the garage. When Theo gets into his cousin’s living space and is looking up at the statue of David, the song is barely audible, playing high over the scene (but it sounds to me like it’s coming from speakers in the scene).

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By: Film Score Junkie https://filmmusicnotes.com/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-9648 Wed, 15 Jan 2014 06:53:07 +0000 https://filmmusicnotes.com/2013/04/21/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-9648 In reply to eammon.

@ Eammon. Yes, the scene you cite in Good Morning Vietnam is a great example of source scoring since it clearly starts as diegetic music (Robin Williams announcing the song on screen), then serves to accompany the montage that follows, which notably has no other sound but the music (in typical montage style).

Kassabian mentions some other examples, for instance one of the last sequences in Mississippi Masala, where harmonica music is heard, seemingly as non-diegetic music, but then established as source music when we see the harmonica player. Another example she cites is in Moonstruck, where, much like Good Morning Vietnam, Loretta is preparing for an outing to the opera and turns on the radio, which then accompanies several dissolves much like non-diegetic music. Finally, she also cites the final scene of Star Wars, where the medal ceremony is accompanied by the march music, but could be either diegetic or non-diegetic music, or somewhere in between as source scoring.

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By: eammon https://filmmusicnotes.com/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-9563 Mon, 13 Jan 2014 16:27:43 +0000 https://filmmusicnotes.com/2013/04/21/diegetic-music-non-diegetic-music-and-source-scoring/#comment-9563 Yeah excellent thread, really helpful. I wanted to ask in good morning Vietnam, at around 1.27.50 robin Williams introduces the track ‘what a wonderful world’ but it then is just playing depicting the Vietnam war as non-diegetic music, is this source scoring ? and have you got anymore example at all ? many thanks

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