#barrington pheloung

Alphabetical reasons to love Lewis, day 2!

Barrington Pheloung is the composer of the Morse and Lewis themes and incidental music.  While the Morse theme sounds like a foggy mystery cut by a beep beep beep beacon (yup, Morse code), Lewis’ theme is inherently uplifting.  There is only one moment in the whole series where I didn’t feel better after hearing the Lewis resolution music:  at the end of the Indelible Stain, Robbie says that he is too stuck in the past to call Laura, and James is going to go home- ostensibly to read, but really to drink himself into oblivion.  Cue the resolution music?  

We were lucky enough to get a Lewis CD (available on Amazon!) after series 1 and 2, but I wish that there had been more.  The spooky variants on the Lewis music in the episode Falling Darkness are especially chilling. It is fun to see Lewis variants pop up in Endeavour now and then too.  The following paragraph I am borrowing from this blog’s entry 22/07/13.

On the Lewis CD liner notes, Barrington Pheloung writes, “For Lewis’ own theme I chose the clarinet- which was always his counterpoint instrument in Morse-  because I loved its “woody” character.  Set within a clearly Mozartian “simplicity/complexity” of orchestration, I have tried to depict Lewis’ deeper maturity and determination and perhaps, his deeper dignity.”   So, umm, speaking of clarinets and dignity, I’m sure it is not a coincidence that in the episode “Dark Matter,” Hobson is playing Lewis’s instrument.  ;)