I just noticed tonight that the accompaniment to the big "Fiyeeerrooo" in the middle of No Good Deed is just very slight variation of the intro music to As Long As You're Mine.

Does anyone else think that's totally brilliant? Like she's going back to her memory of the time they were together, but she thinks he's dead, so the memory is tainted and sad (hence the love theme, but with angry dissonant chords now).

That is really cool!

It's amazing the stuff you pick up when you've seen the show far too much hehe. Yeh I quite like the reoccurring motifs in the music. Others criticise the score for being repetitive but I rather like it.

And that same music is used in the Overture and the bridge leading into "Defying Gravity".

I love that Wicked is composed very operatically. As in, we often hear the same themes and motifs quite a number of times, but they sound so different depending on what part of the show you're at that you hardly notice it. Stephen Schwartz is just amazing.

It's also at the beginning of Dear Old Shiz.



Completely agree! I remember how it took me a while before I realized the similarities between No Good Deed and March of the Witch Hunters, and they're right after one another during the show!

I actually just found this really interesting article that basically analyzes the score, and points out a lot more things I hadn't noticed before.

Wow, you're right. I'd never noticed that.

I heard/read this somewhere lately too, but the "Unlimited" recurring bit is the same as "Somewhere Over the Rainbow".

Oh My God. This article is AMAZING!!!


I guess I forgot just how much of the show that theme is in. I guess it's just an Elphaba thing, not really an Elphaba / Fiyero thing.

I never noticed that before. Very interesting!

Haha wow, I'd not noticed that before either!

i noticed this a while ago, when i started learning NGD...before my banner used to have "the intense ALAYM in NGD" as a KO..i love it soo much, im very much about minor key angstyness, the emotion and energy is just so raw

One of my favorite hidden things in the score is the re-appearance of "Popular" in "Thank Goodness" when Fiyero and Glinda are off talking. Around the point where he says "I can't stand there smiling, pretending to go along with all of this."

Also, the NOMTW motif is in "Wicked Witch of the East" as well as when Elphaba receives the letter from Fiyero preceding "For Good."

It's also the staging, like at the end of TWAI and NGD she strikes the same pose, but in different emotions

^ Ooo, yeah, I hadn't really thought about the similarities between the poses before.

I really like how there's a bit of The Wizard And I when the Wizard and Elphaba are talking in the second act, right before Wonderful. And it's interesting how, in the Cornfield scene, right before Elphaba enters, the music sounds like Bad Situation (one of the early songs that was eventually replaced by What is This Feeling).

There's a handful of Wizard Of Oz references as well. "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" pops up in Thank Goodness. "And if that joy, that thrill, doesn't thrill like you think it will", is similar to "Someday I'll wish upon a star...". I remember Stephen also mentioned something about the Unlimited theme having the same notes or something...I'll have to get back to you on that....and the Optimistic Voices music from WoO is heard in One Short Day.

^ "Unlimited, my future -," has the same 7 notes as the phrase "Somewhere over the rainbow." Copyright law says once you have 8 notes that are the same, there's a problem, hence why he only used the first 7.

It plays under the bring me downs in defying gravity too. I like to think of it as the Wicked Witch of the West theme, whereas the 'unlimited' melody is the Elphaba/hopeful girl theme.

That's one of the things I love about well-written musicals is how you can discover new connections and motifs as the songs randomly roll through your head for the 100th time.

I think my most recent personal discovery was how the Unlimited theme is used to link the moment where Elphaba tries to persuade Glinda to join with her in the line "Together we'll be the greatest team there's ever been, Glinda" with the moment when the Wizard does the same to her in "At long, long last receive your due, long overdue, Elphaba". Though she starts out with her dream all to herself, it can't remain a solitary venture and it gets appropriated to influence the power dynamic in her relationships with Glinda and the Wizard.



Thank you very much for the link to that fine article. It was great how the author referenced times in the CD so I could follow along.

I have to say of everything new I just learned about the score from this thread, the subtly sad Wicked Witch of the West theme at the beginning of Dear Old Shiz was the one that moved me and tore at my heart. It felt like an allusion to predetermined fate, as if saying "and so our tragedy begins to unfold".



It is in the flute during "so I'll be back for good someday".

^Yeah, that's it.

Just finished reading the article today - I can't believe after countless times seeing and hearing the show, I've never noticed that the trumpet at the start of the finale is playing to the tune of the line "a celebration throughout Oz that's all to do with me"!! Same with the slow Wicked Witch theme in Dear Old Shiz.

I just realized the double meaning of the title of "Thank Goodness." It's goodness in the conventional way, of course, but also referring to Glinda, who eventually becomes Glinda the Good. It's foreshadowing, I assume. The song is glorifying Glinda as well as goodness.

well actually in that point in the show (according Morrible) she is already Glinda the Good"

"the day you were first summoned to an audience with Oz, and although he would not tell you officially. when you bowed before his thrown, he decreed you'd hence be known as Glinda the Good offically!!"

Yeah, you're right! That just proves my point in even more. She IS Glinda the Good at this point.

And I believe the lyric is "he would not tell you why initially".

haha yep my bad