Time to light the lights, get yourself a gun, and go where everybody knows your name: Musically, the most important part of any series is the TV theme song, so this week, Consequence will explore just why that is with TV Theme Song Week, celebrating this proud tradition with features, interviews, and lists.
Also be sure to check out “I Never Skip Intro” merch collection in honor of those who know how to appreciate a classic theme; get yours at the Consequence Shop now.
In 2023, composer Holly Amber Church got an Emmy nomination for her very first TV theme song, for Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities. And she knows how special that is: Not the recognition, the fact that she was able to write a piece of music that’s 60 seconds long. “The fact that I got a whole minute, that was luxurious,” she tells Consequence. “I feel like they’re all 30 seconds or less now. Sometimes they’re like ten seconds.”
That’s not an exaggeration — that’s the literal amount of time composers are often asked to work with today, when crafting original music that will serve not just as an introduction to a TV show, but establish its identity. This is a tough request, especially given the importance of the TV theme song, which stretches back to the earliest days of television and has been a fundamental part of the format for decades now.
Church observes that “compared to where it was in, say, the ’50s and ’60s, where I feel like every show absolutely had a theme… I don’t know if I would say it’s on the decline, because there are just so many more shows now, but I feel like it’s all over the place.”
Ron Wasserman, whose credits as a composer of TV theme songs include countless series including the Power Rangers franchise and X-Men: The Animated Series, says he noticed the push towards shorter themes around 2009, while working with the producers on the TV Land series Hot in Cleveland.
“They said, ‘We want what you do. We want a theme that people can hear from the other room and they know it’s the show, they know to come back in. Something hooky, something that speaks to the show.’ All the talking points,” Wasserman says. “And then they said, ‘And we’d like it to be ten seconds. It’s okay if it rings out to ten and a half, 11 seconds.’ So I think we ended up at 12, but there’s no time to build. Within two seconds, you’ve gotta establish that this is the show, and then come up with a memorable little earworm hook and then you’re out.”
What about six seconds? “You can’t establish any kind of sound or hook in that short of time,” he says.
