The Shire

The story moves forward to the waning years of the Third Age of Middle-earth as we are introduced to the Shire. The short piece of music that ushers us into the hobbits’ homeland was originally written for the theatrical cut of the film, but the early Shire scenes were shortened when the Prologue was lengthened, so Shore’s introductory music went unheard until the DVD edit. “We had the piece and I’d almost finished orchestrating it”, the composer recalls. “It didn’t have much of the full Shire theme in it yet, because it was just showing the history of the Shire in a montage. Now, you actually hear the Rural fiddle theme first, then the Pensive setting theme developing from it.” Here too, Shore begins to utilize his Celtic assortment of instruments, including bodhrán, dulcimer, Celtic harp, musette, mandolin and guitar.

Also introduced are the Two-Step Figure, the End Cap, the Hobbit Skip Beat and a more developed statement of the Fellowship theme used under the film’s title graphic.

INSTRUMENTS
HOBBITON

The Hobbit/Shire theme’s Rural Setting is most closely connected to these signature hobbit instruments. But as the hobbits depart the Shire and adventure their way through Middle-earth, these Celtic sounds continually make their way into the edges of the orchestra as a reminder of what the Shire folk have left behind.

FIDDLE
Listening Example: Disc One | Track Two | 1:18
The fiddle itself is not unlike the classical violin of the orchestra (though occasionally performers will adapt the instruments’ bridges), but the playing techniques differ slightly allowing for greater latitude in bowing and ornamentations.

BODHRÁN
Listening Example: Disc One | Track Two | 1:34
The bodhrán (Bough-rawn) is just one of an ancient family of frame drums that consist of a stretched hide over a wooden shell. Bodhrán drums are believed to have originated in Ireland (or possibly emigrated there via the Roman Empire or Arabic trade routes), and derived their name from a Gaelic description of the sound, roughly translated as “thundered.”

DULCIMER
Listening Example: Disc One | Track Two | 1:18
Hammered dulcimers consist of a series of wires stretched tightly over a wooded resonating frame and struck with small hammers. The name comes from the Latin and Greek hybrid of the words dulce (sweet) and melos (tone).

CELTIC HARP
Listening Example: Disc One | Track Four| 1:55
Also known as Irish harp, lever harp or simply, folk harp, the Celtic harp is a smaller, more portable version of the orchestral harp, well suited to diatonic music.

MUSETTE
Listening Example: Disc One | Track Three | 1:11
The musette is a small, diatonic, accordion-like instrument consisting of a keyboard affixed to bellows. Howard Shore wrote a handful of musette lines to provide harmonic accompaniment to the Shire theme’s Rural Setting.

MANDOLIN
Listening Example: Disc One | Track Four| 1:48
A smaller relative of the guitar, the mandolin is a short-necked, eight-stringed lute that is plucked with the fingers. Mandolin does not appear regularly in the Shire music, but a few gently strummed chords back the Bag End scenes.

GUITAR
Listening Example: Disc One | Track Three | 2:58
Guitar plays the same role in the Shire music as the mandolin, but it enters in more sprightly passages, using a highstring tuning. The high strings of a 12-string set are strung on a 6-string guitar resulting in a bright sound.

CELESTA
Listening Example: Disc One | Track Two| 2:21
The celesta is a small keyboard instrument like the piano. Yet, where the piano’s hammers strike taught wires inside the frame, the celesta strikes small metal bars to produce a shimmering silvery tone.