5 - Warriors' Gate

Composer: Peter Howell
Composer: Paul Joyce

What's the score?
As the Doctor returns from E-Space through the pocket universe of the Gateway, so we return from Paddy Kingsland to Peter Howell. His score is generally melodic, but inclined towards the weird. String sounds and breathy atmospheres take centre stage here.

Musical notes

• Once again, Howell is presented with a long tracking shot at the start of Part One that could be taken as an invitation to the composer. This time, however, he stays silent while the camera pans slowly around the slavers' cargo hold full of comatose Tharils, only fading in as we approach the action on the ship's bridge.
• The signature sound for the Tharils is something like a dulcimer or a zither, sometimes jangling and sometimes echoing. (It could be a cimbalom, or at least the synth equivalent.) It's the kind of thing you might hear in a Cold War spy film; it might be meant to suggest antiquity, exoticism or mystery, all of which would be appropriate to this story. It's also heard in Part Two when Romana is strapped into the slavers' navigator chair as a surrogate Tharil.
• A shimmering synth sound is heard when Tharils walk through the Gateway mirror. It's a bit like a Flexatone pitched down several octaves, or like those plastic "booming" tubes you sometimes see in dollar shops.
• The Gundan robots have an off-kilter marching theme, solid on the beat and with a servo-like whine in between. A halting, jerking version plays when the decrepit Gundan comes to life in Part Two; a faster, more confident version plays over the Part Three cliffhanger when the newly minted Gundans storm the Tharils' banqueting hall.
• This week's "oo-wee-oo" sound comes near the start of Part Three, when the Doctor discovers that his hand has been healed after passing through the mirror.
• Scenes in the Tharils' gardens are accompanied by whimsical noodlings on the synth. Is there just a hint of the leading phrase from Debussy's "Prelude a l'apres-midi d'un faune" in there?
• Part Three features what I think is the first bit of diegetic music (i.e. music that we're supposed to believe the characters can hear - remember that word!) in 80s DW: the Tharil banqueting music. It's a stately piece in the medieval style, combining ethereal pipe sounds with the sort of pulsing rhythm you'd get from a hurdy-gurdy. Antiquity is clearly the intended effect here.
• Abrupt jumps between time zones in the hall are signalled by a sort of backwards washing sound. Howell fades this down fairly quickly in the Part Four reprise, but keeps it going into the credits at the end of Part Three.
• This week's pop pick: the eerie cue that plays while Lazlo wakes the other Tharils in the cargo hold in Part Four. It's a lovely minor key tune in a high-pitched synth over a refrain using low string sounds.

Vox pop
Another great score from Peter Howell, with a more experimental edge than his previous two. It's interesting to hear him trying out unconventional material in a mostly melodic score - not just the washing and shimmering effects, but some striking stuttering sounds too in the derelict hall in Part One. The roots of Howell's next two scores - for the two Mara stories - can be found here. This is one I come back to again and again.

Availability

• The BBC DVD release includes the full isolated score as an audio option.
• Doctor Who - The Music included a minute-and-a-half track titled "Banqueting Music", which combined material from the Tharil banqueting scenes in Part Three with Dick Mills' "time winds" sound.