Music of Middle-earth

Scholars have noted that while readers often skip Tolkien's poetry and songs at a first reading, these in fact are highly relevant and give insight into the meaning of his books.

Amongst dramatic adaptations, Stephen Oliver contributed an extensive and diverse suite of instrumental music and song-settings for the BBC Radio Lord of the Rings adaptation in 1981, while Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings film trilogy is accompanied by Howard Shore's long, varied, and prizewinning score.

[1][2] The Ainulindalë (Quenya: "Music of the Ainur") is the creation account in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium, the first part of The Silmarillion as published posthumously in 1977.

[T 1][3] Scholars such as Marjorie Burns have noted the work's basis in the Prose Edda of Norse mythology, and in Tolkien's Catholicism; with parallels between Eru Ilúvatar and God, and between Melkor and the rebellious Satan, in the Genesis account.

The first is the Dwarves' joking song "Chip the glasses and crack the plates" as they wash up after dinner in Bilbo's home, Bag End, before setting out on their quest.

to the bottle I goTo heal my heart and drown my woe.Rain may fall and wind may blow,And many miles be still to go,But under a tall tree I will lie,And let the clouds go sailing by.

[8] The verses include songs of many genres: for wandering, marching to war, drinking, and having a bath; narrating ancient myths; of praise and lament (elegy), sometimes reflecting Old English poetry.

[8] Brian Rosebury writes that the distinctive thing about Tolkien's verse is its "individuation of poetic styles to suit the expressive needs of a given character or narrative moment",[9] giving as examples of its diversity Gollum's "comic-funereal rhythm" in The cold hard lands / They bites our hands; the Marching Song of the Ents; the celebratory psalm of the Eagles; the hymns of the Elves; the chants of the Dwarves; the "song-speech" of Tom Bombadil; and the Hobbits' diverse songs, "variously comic and ruminative and joyful".

[9] Lynn Forest-Hill writes that Tom Bombadil controls his world with song, in a manner recalling the hero Väinämöinen in the Finnish epic, the Kalevala;[10] indeed, he only speaks in metre.

", may "do nothing to move the plot along", but shows how Elves may view mortal men, and supplies "a poignant context both for the memory of Eorl the Young and for the heroic deeds which are to follow".

"[12] Sayer states in the liner notes of the LP album of the recordings that Tolkien sang the song to "an old English folk-tune called The Fox and Hens."

In the view of the Tolkien scholar David Bratman, both works mainly aim not to tell the story but to create a mood, though de Meij's fourth movement, "Journey in the Dark", is programmatic.

[27] Led Zeppelin's songs "Ramble On", "Misty Mountain Hop", and especially "The Battle of Evermore" duet sung by Robert Plant and Sandy Denny on their untitled 1971 album, make references to several characters and events from The Lord of the Rings,[28][29] including Sauron, the Ringwraiths,[30] Gollum, and Mordor.

[31] For instance, the German power-metal band Blind Guardian's 1998 album Nightfall in Middle-Earth consists of songs about and narration of parts of The Silmarillion.

[32][33][34] The 1991 album Shepherd Moons by the Irish musician Enya contains an instrumental titled "Lothlórien", in reference to the forest home of Galadriel's elves.