The Lord's (at that time merely Sir's) music selections are typically diverse - from rock 'n' roller Shostakovich to Bollywood composer AR Rahman - as well as typically populist - Elvis Presley and The Beatles. Only one pick was a musical theatre number but it was a goody: Rodgers and Hammerstein's "Some Enchanted Evening".
Hard to argue with that. But what makes the melody so enchanting? For me, the secret of the song is in one little semi-tone. Let's take the first six notes:
"Some En-chan-ted Eve-ning"
The second of those notes is an F sharp. If you are of a certain musical disposition and knowing that we are in the key of C, you may give a small shudder. F sharp, you see, is foreign to the key of C. It should be an F natural. Play a C chord and stick an F sharp on top of it and it sounds dissonant, wonky, wrong.
So how come this wrongness sounds so right? Well, firstly the F sharp falls on an off-beat - the "en" of "enchanted" - so there isn't a direct clash with the chord underneath. Place that F sharp on an on-beat like the "eve" of "eve-ning" and the whole thing sounds wonky again.
Secondly, try substituting the foreign-sounding F sharp for a "proper" F natural. Go on, I dare you. With just that tiny change the melody feels so different; it's lighter and brighter but, at the same time, a whole lot less enchanting.
The song is from South Pacific. The character singing is Emile de Becque, a romantic (he's French) and exotic (he has half-Polynesian kids) plantation owner with a dark past (he killed a man). In short, he is a man who would definitely sing an F sharp.
Sometimes a semi-tone makes all the difference.
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