Everyone knows the main melody of the Intermezzo (Ratcliff’s Dream) from Mascagni’s opera Guglielmo Ratcliff (1895) even if they have never heard of this opera or the composer before, and this is because it is very similar to the song we all know – “Over the Rainbow”, composed by Harold Arlen for the classic film The Wizard of Oz (1939). I have always been interested in music/film similarities, and possible plagiarism claims, and have decided to investigate this further in this ranty post.
To begin with, certain facts do not sit well with me. On the one hand, we have a quite obscure Italian opera and, on the other, one of the most iconic film tunes of all time. Guglielmo Ratcliff is rarely performed, not least because of its voicing difficulty, and it was also overshadowed by the composer’s own work, opera Cavalleria Rusticana, meaning that an average person (especially outside of Italy) would likely not know of it. The Intermezzo was later used in Scorsese’s Raging Bull (1980), but this occurred about 40 years after the legacy of “Over the Rainbow” had already been cemented. Another interesting fact is that, in essence, Harold Arlen is known for “Over the Rainbow”. He was a prolific composer and was nominated for nine Academy Awards, but he won only one of them – and that was for “Over the Rainbow”. The situation reminds me slightly of Gary Ross and Anne Spielberg being nominated for an Academy Award in the category of Best Original Screenplay for film Big (1988) even though their whole so-called “original idea” is essentially an Italian comedy of the year before – Da Grande (1987). At least the Italian audience could clearly see that it was a remake of sorts.
Harold Arlen received a well-rounded musical education. The Harold Arlen website says that his father Samuel Arluck was a celebrated cantor with deep love for classical music and Italian opera, who introduced his son to both classical music and Italian opera at the very young age. It is unthinkable that Arlen did not know who Pietro Mascagni was or never heard of Guglielmo Ratcliff, but I am also quite sceptical about Arlen “subconsciously taking” the melody without realising it, although it is possible. The reason I am sceptical is that ordinary people without musical backgrounds are more likely to be guilty of taking some melody and passing it “as their own invention”, doing so quite innocently, but it is much less likely for professional music composers to do so because their task is to compose original music and if they go wrong with their “originality”, there is much more at stake, including their careers and reputation.
Then, there is a whole story of how Harold Arlen came to write the main melody of “Over the Rainbow”. In his biography of Arlen, Walter Rimler reports that it was the last song of the film to be written (other songs were already in place). Arlen claims he was suffering from a writers’ block for weeks before driving to Grauman’s Chinese (there is even a name for the place) with his wife Anya, who was at the wheel (very important), when the melody “suddenly came into his mind”. Arlen asked his wife to stop the car near Schwab’s drugstore on Sunset Boulevard (another important detail) and then Arlen proceeded to write the melody down “on the manuscript paper he carried everywhere”. Arlen said at that point that “it was as if the Lord said, ‘Well, here it is, now stop worrying about it’”. That is one godsent, genius-level inspiration that came unexpectedly at the strangest of times (or perhaps there was a certain scheduled orchestra program on the radio in that car that evening?) For me it looks like someone asking a suspect whether they have done this or that deed and they proceed to tell their whole biography with all sorts of unrelated details thrown in before they say “yes” or “no”. But, jokes aside, it is still curious why there was a need for a story as to how Arlen wrote the song. Was it necessary so there would be an explanation later of how he wrote it? In a forum I read years ago but cannot now locate, someone said that they read that Arlen later contacted his lyricist and told him that his new melody is “from an opera, but that’s ok” (something that cannot be verified).
As far as I know, there are no other detailed background stories as to how Arlen wrote other songs for The Wizard of Oz (and not like he needed much inspiration as, for example, song “If I Only Had a Brain” was already written for Arlen’s other musical, but never used). And, what a coincidence it is that the Ratcliff’s Dream segment of the opera is all about dreaming, haunting visions, the blurring of fantasy and reality, and family curses, and the part of Dorothy in “Over the Rainbow” is all to do with her daydreaming, trying to escape reality into the fantasy world and also previously having issues with the family.
Schenkerian analysis refers to a method of analysing music based on the theories of Heirich Schenker, demonstrating the relationship of notes to a composition’s deep structure. If one performs this comparative analysis on the scores of Mascagni’s Intermezzo and Harold Arlen’s “Over the Rainbow” then one would discover some major melodic and harmonic similarities, including in registral opening (the same ascending leap/interval, followed by descending linear progressions that culminate in a downward progression), descending motions after the initial ascent, and the same prolongational techniques. Of course, pop music is different from classical, and it uses different rules, but this fact is also quite damning because the mere fact that we can instantly recognise “Over the Rainbow” in a completely different musical tradition, in classical Intermezzo (Ratcliff’s Dream), even when played in a different tempo, is already telling us that the main elements of both compositions (I mean, its integral melodic line) are essentially the same.
I think the similarities are all the more glaring (at least to my sensitive ears) when you hear the instrumental version of “Over the Rainbow” (see above) rather than the version sung by Garland in the film. Naturally, classical music is more complex, and there is a reduction of the dramatic force of the integral melodic line in “Over the Rainbow” to emphasise hope over tragedy, but it is still easily recognisable (if you are thinking about something else while listening to the two recordings above, you can actually get confused which one you have on). In his biographical work, Walter Rimler refers to the song “Over the Rainbow” when he says that composer Arlen “had come up with a handful of notes that have meant more to people than those of any other song”. Well, the issue here, of course, is that it seems that those “handful of notes” had already been in existence, composed by someone else.
🎵 What do you think of this similarity?
N.B. Some also noted the similarities between “Over the Rainbow” and Signe Lund’s Concert Étude in F major (second theme), but I think that Ratcliff’s Dream is a closer work to “Over the Rainow” because there, in contrast to Lund’s work, the whole melodic line seems to be present without changed “rising” beginning, and of course, Ratcliff’s Dream is an earlier work than Lund’s piece.
The book consulted to write this post – The Man That Got Away [2015] by Walter Rimler (ironically, the title of Arlen’s biography (after the famous song)).
The header picture is etching Guglielmo Ratcliff, Act III, scene II.
Thoughts on Papyrus 
There is a clear correlation between the two Diana. This is quite shocking.
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The story behind ‘Rainbow’ is fascinating but it doesn’t sound as if the influence was unconscious , especially when you point out how both pieces are used in their respective stories.
The melody from the opera is lovely.
This makes me think about plagiarism in other fields too, from creating recipes to writing and visual art and other creative endeavours. How much is okay? I think percentages are used in music to determine if the original composer should be paid for copyright.
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That’s interesting about calculating percentages in music to prove claims. I believe certain jurisdictions also talk about there being a “significant” or “substantial” taking, decided on a case-by-case basis, but the “essence” also seems to me to be important. As for other fields, some years ago I wrote a post comparing A. J. Finn’s novel’s The Woman in the Window to Sarah A. Denzil’s thriller Saving April, and, oh, boy. Not only was there “substantial” taking – clearly, but it looked like Finn copy-pasted her whole paragraphs, rearranging slightly her wording and sentences. That definitely went way beyond just taking her idea: Did A. J. Finn (“The Woman in the Window” (2018)) plagiarise Sarah A. Denzil’s thriller “Saving April” (2016)? – Thoughts on Papyrus
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Cavalleria Rusticana was well-known even in my small Missouri hometown, as the college theater performed it (I was one of the children and all I remember is that it was a whip-cracking scene).
I feel like I’m always humming something from somewhere else, sometimes only slightly changed. There’s a melody from the Russian opera Prince Igor in the 1950’s musical Kismet (Stranger in Paradise) and Eric Carmen’s 1975 song All By Myself is based on a melody from Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto #2.
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That’s interesting, but these are all acknowledged credits, aren’t they? And, Rachmaninoff is not only credited for All By Myself, but his estate also receives 12% share from the song.
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Acknowledgement is important but I’m not generally in favor of money going to an “estate.” I read Lewis Hyde’s book about copyright (Common as Air) in 2011 and have been influenced by his ideas, mostly that copyright should only for the author’s lifetime.
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Your post on the comparisons between the two books is extraordinary, Diana.
Not having read either book, I was reminded of the plot of The Girl on the Train but the details you’ve provided points towards Finn/Mallory taking an existing book and ‘improving’ it.
I’d call that theft or plagiarism. I agree that the story’s essence counts in this type of assessment.
I was horrified to realise that Colleen McCullough’s The Ladies of Missalonghi had the same plot as LM Montgomery’s The Blue Castle. When the similarities were noticed McCullough said they were subconscious, that she must have remembered the plot from reading The Blue Castle as a child.
She was a good writer who never faced other allegations of plagiarism so I tend to believe her.
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Thanks! One thing is borrowing ideas from a lesser known book and trying to improve on them (which sounds fine), but another thing, as with Finn, is clearly taking many detailed plot lines and many detailed characters, and even rewriting chapters and sentences. That I don’t understand at all.
And, this is very interesting about The Ladies of Missalonghi/The Blue Castle. I didn’t know about it so thanks for telling me. I believe in innocent subconscious taking, but I also think it all depends on its extent and we tend to subconsciously take bits and pieces, I think, maybe characters, but the whole identical plot and most of the characters sounds less believable. Writing a book takes a lot of time, and at no point the author stopped and thought: “wait a minute, my whole story and most of my characters may not be original at all – they remind me of something else – what?” or “how did I come up with this rather than that?” It will depend how the author engaged with the story and whether there were fairy-tale-like tropes that we all subconsciously carry inside us as these are easy for us to reproduce. I want to believe that if I were to write a book, I would certainly know if my whole plot and characters had other original source, but perhaps that’s easier said than done, and in McCullough’s case, I think you are right, and this may be innocent borrowing.
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I can understand wanting to take a less-well known book, improve it and pass it off as your own, but there is nothing ethical about doing so, at least not without the original author’s consent and letting the reading world know how the story began.
There are probably loads of writers who couldn’t come up with a plot if they were being forced at gunpoint to do so, but who write beautifully. Perhaps they should become ghostwriters or editors of some sort – I think you mentioned this work was the role of a creative editor in a comment on the post about the Finn book.
The Ladies of Missalonghi was Colleen McCullough’s fifth book and her previous books had been enormously successful, and to my mind, highly original. I can understand a childhood memory surfacing as a book plot, as had a similar experience myself. I’d been turning over a possible plot in my mind for years, only to re-read a Stephen King short story and discover that ‘my’ story was clearly based on his. The link below will tell you the story!
I’ve reviewed The Blue Castle and commented there about the McCullough link, but don’t think I’ve reviewed that book.
I think you’d enjoy reading and comparing the Blue Castle and The Ladies of Missalonghi. Both are quick reads.
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Yes, thanks, I do want to read both The Blue Castle and The Ladies of Missalonghi at some point to compare. I love this exercise. I also enjoyed reading your post on Just After Sunset. I actually really like your idea of pairing shared destiny, existential uncertainty, ghosts with touching romance. This makes it so much more emotional, philosophical and thought-provoking. It does sound to me though like an idea borrowing (certainly, not plot) and misremembering where you got it – in this instance from King, but, hypothetically, it may as well be other places. King certainly did not invent the twist of people realising in the end that they are actually ghosts. Almost every other Goosebumps book I read in my early adolescence had a twist in the end where people turned out to be ghosts (and I am sure the idea goes much further back…to Henry James always toying with the idea in his shorter fiction?, or to Ambrose Bierce’s story of 1890, perhaps?), and, since the talk is about plot twists, King’s story might as well have been penned in the aftermath of the The Sixth Sense film phenomenon. It looks very possible.
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It’s impossible for artists of any kind not to take ideas and inspiration from others, but in my case, the chill of recognition I felt after re-reading Stephen King’s story was exactly that, a physical sensation that went down my back!
Glad you liked the plot, either way. I just don’t see an end to the story! I can’t read (or enjoy) The Twilight books for similar reasons; I feel like love affairs between vampires that are hundreds of years old and teenagers are far-fetched. Their conversation would bore each other to tears! As for being with another vampire (or another ghost in my story) for hundreds of years, no way! They would be trying to kill each other look before then.
The plot twist in The Sixth Sense probably did send other writers down a similar path. There is always a wave of similar stories after a bestselling film or book, which I think would be commissioned.
The Goosebumps books were so popular! I was a young adult when they started so missed all the fun, was too young for The Twilight Zone too, but the few of those that I did see had fabulous twists.
I’m not familiar with Ambrose Bierce, so looked him up and found An Occurrence at Owl Creek and have saved this to read soon.
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I agree with you about the Twilight’s vampires, though I never actually seen any of the films or read the books, and still don’t understood the fuss. All I know is that it is about vampires 😉 On the other hand, I do want to see The Twilight Zone or at least some of it, which I haven’t. Season 1 appeals to me, and I now see on Wikipedia that short French film An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge (1961) was screened as part of an episode of the Twilight Zone of 1964. Interesting.
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I can see what you mean – the octave leap followed by the semitone drop is reminiscent, then the general downward trend of the melody with those distinctive upward arabesque patterns – but I remain to be convinced. One could for example argue that ‘Bali Hai’ from ‘South Pacific’ has a similar overall profile, even including the octave leap and following semitone drop, with a melodic line generally spiralling down. Early blues music, echoing West African vocal patterns, also featured a yearning upward leap spiralling back down of course.
That’s not to say Arlen wasn’t influenced, consciously or subconsciously, by the Mascagni. But then, the prolific tumesmith Schubert is said to not have known whether the tunes that popped into his head were newly composed, ones he’d composed before and forgotten, or came ultimately from remembrance of some other tune he’d heard. Who knows what influences feed into the artist’s imaginative maelstrom?
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It’s hard to argue with a professional 🙂 You are right, but, if there was a conscious influence, I think it is right for the artist to acknowledge it, and if only, if only both melodies did not sound so very similar. You cannot deny it is just shocking when you hear one after another (Bali Hai just doesn’t sound the same way, at least to untrained ears). And, of course, part of the reason for this post is that so few people are actually aware of this similarity or the existence of Guglielmo Ratcliff.
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Good points – there’s unconscious borrowing and there’s plagiarism, and it’s not always possible to be certain. I think the clincher here is probably Arlen admitting he might have unwittingly used a tune he’d heard from some opera.
I know Paul McCartney admitted the tune and chord sequence to ‘Yesterday’ popped into his head as if from a dream, and I heard a source online suggest quite plausibly that the overall feel and shape of it was indebted to a popular dance tune his trumpeter father Jim used in play in an amateur band; unfortunately I never made a note of the tune’s title. For what it’s worth ‘Georgia on my mind’ is one supposed influence, National King Cole’s ‘Answer Me, My Love’ is another.
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That’s interesting about McCartney and how he came up with Yesterday, I didn’t know that about his father’s possible connection there. I also now wonder what tune that was. All I recall is that his inspiration came with his dream and then with his breakfast of an omelette 🙂
Another example which I think you know is Michael Nyman and his score for the film The Piano. So many people just do not understand how he was not nominated for an Oscar for this score, but this would have been very awkward, of course, because the main track of the film – The Heart Asks Pleasure First is the exact tune of a traditional Scottish song Gloomy Winter’s Noo Awa, which is also based on a previous folklore tune. But, it seems that everything and everyone still credit Michael Nyman as the composer of The Heart Asks Pleasure First, and the CDs sold (let alone film concerts) don’t actually mention the curious fact that it is not his original composition.
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Nyman is interesting, because much of his film music drew (still draws?) from sources appropriate to the themes and period of the movie. When composers borrow from traditional music in an arrangement that’s usually, though not always, acknowledged somewhere.
Composers naturally get the credit for arranging variations (for example) on folk tunes, such as Mozart’s “Ah, vous dirais-je, man”. It’s well known that “Can’t Help Falling In Love”, as sung by Elvis Presley and Andy Williams, is heavily indebted to “Plaisir d’amour”, a 1784 French love song written by Jean-Paul-Égide Martini, but credits go to Hugo Peretti, Luigi Creatore, and George David Weiss because of new lyrics, adapted melodic line, and the addition of a middle eight. And of course the French original is out of copyright so clearly the industry’s attitude is Yah-boo sucks to Martini!
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Very interesting! You also said it – “It’s well known that…” so perhaps what I also meant is the difference between songs and scores which are more or less known as folk songs and musicians credited anyway (Mozart + popular folklore children’s song) and which, like in Nyman’s case, few would be aware of and possibly shocked to find out (“conveniently” obscure ones). That does make a difference too.
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