Cues No. 1 & 2

This final film (though it is a two-part story) opens with the unused original Hedwig's Theme logo music from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001). This bookends the series with the feeling of a curtain going up for the final act of an opera. As the Warner Brothers logo continues, the new Deathly Hallows theme partially sounds out in the horns. The theme crescendos, incomplete, into the darkness and everything stops. 

On the close-up of Scrimgeour, the low strings enter quietly. Violas shiver around, waiting on his broken speech. The violins eventually enter as he concludes and a dissonant crescendo, accompanied by brass and tamtam, ends the scene. The only instruments holding on through the transition to the Daily Prophet headline are the strings. They hold over the tragic news of a muggle family being murdered, then reprise the falling lament from Dumbledore’s death at the conclusion of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2021). 

The cello section begins an ascending motif on their own. One section at a time joins in until all of the strings are playing independent quasi-fugal parts over the cuts between Hermione, Ron, and Harry’s lives after year six. This music continues until the moment Hermione realizes she must now Obliviate her parents in order to keep them safe. A solo horn plays a distressed version of her theme, then she reluctantly erases her parents’ memories of her. 

The Pensieve Theme plays in reverse, representing the opposite magical memory keeping that we have seen thus far in the series. The independent ascending motif returns in a burst of emotion that crescendos through the long shots of Hermione disappearing from her family photos. This climaxes on the shot of Harry standing outside the Dursley’s watching his aunt, uncle, and cousin leave forever. The cellos play an emotional Family Theme, and then we cut back to Hermione, who is now walking away from her own home, possibly for the last time. The violas have the last descending scale before everything drops out. The Hedwig celesta solo and main title from the arrival of baby Harry, first heard sixteen years previously on the doorstep of number four Privet Drive, return to usher in this final chapter in the tale of Harry Potter. 

As the main title passes the camera, another Deathly Hallows theme sounds out in the horns, taking over the texture and launching attacca into the second cue. 

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Choir continues from the opening titles, and woodwinds, harp, and celesta swirl around as Malfoy Manor comes into view. The Death Eater Theme plays underneath the violent yet beautiful texture, then motoric strings and timpani take over as Severus Snape forms from the flying shadow making its way through the night sky. Trumpets sound the first large-scale presentation of the Call of the Prince. Snape’s identity is now bound to his killing of Albus Dumbledore just weeks before. 

Inside the great gothic entryway, the strings continue the Call of the Prince theme to its conclusion, then pause as Snape reaches the upstairs room. Voldemort 2 plays on the first shot of the Dark Lord, welcoming him back to the series after a hiatus in Half-Blood Prince. Low ominous textures move around underneath the dialogue, never stable and always wondering when someone will snap. 

Voldemort 1 comes in for the first time in the low woodwinds with harp adding some dissonance. A callback to the shivering strings from the Death Eaters’ invasion of Hogwarts also makes its way in and out of the conversation. The low strings continue with a quiet tamtam underneath, then a crescendo accompanies Bellatrix’s Theme as Voldemort snaps at Wormtail. 

A brief celesta solo from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004) that accompanies the mystery of Peter Pettigrew is heard over Wormtail apologizing to Voldemort, underneath an eerie shot of a floating Hogwarts professor. As the attention shifts back to the task at hand, a close-mouthed choir enters singing, for the first time in this film, the 3-Note Motif. The real discussion of how to kill Harry Potter has begun. A low Wand of the Phoenix is played by the cellos and basses upon the mentioning of Harry and Voldemort’s wands being unable to duel one another. As Voldemort addresses this issue and moves slowly down the table behind his Death Eaters, a Chamber of Secrets-style slithering appears in the strings. 

The music pauses as Voldemort reaches Lucius. The low woodwinds move slowly, then the middle woodwinds take over. Another crescendo amplifies the loss that Lucius feels not only when his wand is taken, but when he sees the handle snapped off violently by Voldemort. A solo alto flute plays under this moment before passing the material to a solo clarinet. Some chromatic movement in the harp closes out the conversation, then Voldemort’s attention turns to the prisoner hanging upside down above them. 

As Charity Burbage hovers down the table, the Chamber of Secrets 2 Theme, now commonly associated with Voldemort’s evil plans, plays alongside strings trilling with nervous excitement. The choir returns as well, and Voldemort 2 is heard quietly and coldly under the explanation that the Wizarding race must be purified. 

The 3-Note returns in harp and choir with the string section employing extended techniques and dissonance. A solo voice cuts above the orchestra, adding even more dissonance and a sense of doom for the single soul Voldemort has his eyes fixed on. At the top of the crescendo, the orchestra snaps at Voldemort’s killing curse, and Charity falls, dead before she hits the table. 

A sad and conclusive musical gesture accompanies her tear that is still making its way down her face, but is quickly interrupted by the orchestra’s final climax as Nagini now slithers towards her dinner. The 3-Note Motif and both of Voldemort’s themes play together until the great snake leaps at the camera and all cuts to black.