Citizen Kane Music Analysis

Accompanying Charles Kane success, failure, and death the music in “Citizen Kane” is an indispensable factor for its triumph. Citizen Kane is one of the greatest films to ever be produced believe many critics. Well, it is definitely a 1941 American Masterpiece attributed to Orsan Welles. In addition to directing the film, Welles produced, co-wrote, and starred in Citizen Kane. It is praised for its innovation in visual techniques, narrative methods and of course music. In this paper I will examine the treatment of the music in “Citizen Kane” and highlight all its special aspects in order to answer this proposed question: would have the greatest movie of all times been so great without its extraordinary music ? The music of Citizen Kane was

Carringer (1996) the author of “The making of Citizen Kane” asserts that the music in the film was used to highlight scene changes. Sometimes the transition of music from one scene to another was shocking and sudden while others it was gentle and continuous.. The choice of the music transition pace was dependent on the reaction Welles and Herrmann wanted to trigger in the viewer. In fact, one important characterization of the music in Citizen Kane is its shocking transition declare many critics. An example of such a transition is evident in the early scenes of the movie specifically in the newsreel shot after Kane’s death scene. The end of Kane’s death scene was accompanied with a calm and slow-paced music that gradually fades but was followed with a fast-paced and lurid music of the newsreel to shock the

The music did not accompany every scene but was only used when needed. It was used only in places where it is useful and influential in order to highlight specific emotions of love, tension, or power. Mrs. Kane had an intense blank expression when she stands at the window looking at Charles playing in the snow after she signed the papers for Thatcher. “Mrs. Kane's seemingly blank expression draws significance from the music, somber chords in the low register of the strings” says Leff (p.14 , 1985). The music emphasizes the sorrow Mrs. Kane experiences when sending her son away. The previous scene had no music accompaniment ,thus, Herrmann has wisely chose to have the music when Mrs. Kane expressions are shown at a closer range in order to heighten the scene’s dramatic