Also, another interesting thing about Javerts Suicide: his whole number is a literal copy of the song Valjean sings at the beginning, which shows that he can’t escape him, no matter how much he wants to. The only time when Valjean’s music stops and Javert’s comes in, is when he jumps, and thus finally escapes from Valjean

OKAY BUT THE FACT LOVELY LADIES AND TURNING HAVE THE SAME MOTIF IS CRAZY TO ME

Quick! Get Sideways!

The "On My Own"  might simply mean that every character who sings it, dies in the story.

Bamatabois: a local jerk

22:00 actually, that motif is the start to both Valjean's and Javert's soliloquies.

This is a holdover from earlier versions, where the Prologue *doesn't exist*. Therefore, this is actually a Javert theme, which shows his distress.

Later, it gets expanded on when he thinks of ending things.

Then, in later versions, his song gets another version sung by Valjean in the prologue which we now know as "Valjean's soliloquy".

Interesting bit of history.

49:03 I think this theme means “looking at something beautiful”
1. Parole = his new life of freedom
2. Fantine = looking at the hallucination of cosette and looking at “the light”
3. Eponine = her imaginary life with Marius and what she dreams her life could be
4. JVJ = on that page he is telling cosette the truth of her childhood before he dies, which she had begged him for but he didn’t want to tell. He is setting her free as he is himself dying, looking at entering his afterlife without any burdens or regrets from his life on earth.

10:30 for me is their freedom and safety being taken away

Oooh I have some thoughts! The motif Javert sings at 32:40 is actually Do You Hear the People Sing, but in minor and with a slightly different rhythm. So it makes total sense for Enjolras to sing it later, and Javert sings it here because he’s pretending to be one of the revolutionaries. I can think of two reasons why it’s in minor:
1) because the situation is more serious than it was the first time we heard the song
2) because Javert is pretending to be a revolutionary, so he gets the revolution song, but altered
Maybe it’s both!

25:36 this melody actually reminds me of Javert's melody in the first robbery scene!

38:35 he's not just cut off before he can finish the song, he's cut off before "..grows up!". I... 😭

35:50 Listen closely, this is "On My Own" in a minor key. I wonder if you could make any connections regarding that.
"You are wrong, and always have been wrong" could be interpreted as Javere being alone in his wrongness.
"Dear Cosette, you're such a lonely child" is literally about loneliness.
So perhaps factor that into 48:55, "Starting a new life". I do think genuinely, that motif has more to do with "Own My Own", because death is a journey into the unknown all on your own.

Anyway, I just saw this show live for the first time. It was incredible. Thank you for this, I'll be thinking of it when I watch it again.

9:40 While the woman and Bamatabois are trying to strip Fantine of her dignity at a very vulnerable time, I think, in a way, Valjean's dignity is his identity as Madeleine, and Javert is trying to strip him of it at a vulnerable time. Valjean is known to be very ashamed of his past sins, which is exactly the point of him being an honest man and changing his identity. Even in the book, there's like 10 whole pages of him just going back and forth in a dilemma of revealing his identity to save the man who looked like him.

And so Fantine went against Bamatabois the same way Valjean denied Javert's suspicions.

tl;dr valjean's identity holds his dignity and javert is trying to strip it away from him the same way bamatabois did to fantine

I interpret the motif that plays in on parole as a death Motif, because Valjeans old life "died"

I don't think it's an oppression or argument motif. Yes, the motifs are sung together while someone is being oppressed/they're arguing but note how they sing the melody whenever one of them is talking about their own sense of justice. In the beginning, Javert sings that melody as he explains to Valjean why he was a criminal; he is enforcing his own idea of justice onto Valjean. The next time they sing it, Javert confronts Valjean and they switch roles because this time, Valjean is the one explain to Javert his own idea of justice (i.e. giving justice to Fantine's death by seeking out her child to take care of her). It's a sense of justice Motif, because they each have their own idea of justice and they sing this melody to explain it to the other.

This was so stunning! I've been hyperfixated on this soundtrack recently and you were Incredible at identifying and cutting in clips of the repeated motifs, as well as then explaining how they layer to give us a greater depth of understanding of the characters. Thank you so much!!

10:32 I honestly think the motif is more simple, it's "another obstacle thrown at the heroes" motif.
In this case, Javert's suspicions start a spiral that screws over Valjean like those people did with Fantine earlier.

Thanks for this fun video! The song that Javert sings when trying to trick the students, that comes back with Enroljas singing a more gentle version (“They won’t attack until it’s light…”) is kind of a play on “Do you hear the people sing?” in both cases, which is something to think about.

I just watched/listened to Les Miserables for the first time last week and have had the music in my head non-stop ever since.  The more I listened, the more I noticed these leitmotifs throughout.  I really appreciate your aggregation and analyses of these, as it was driving me crazy trying to figure out when certain motifs get used when.  ❤

oh my gosh. i was so happy when i saw a fifty minute video about music theory in les mis!!! it's a recent hyperfixation of mine and i simply adore it. i have been a long time fan of sideways, and i think they would like it! ALSO THANK YOU THE PARIS/LOOK DOWN APPRECIATION IVE BEEN LOOKING FOR!!!!! ITS LITERALLY ONE OF MY FAVORITE SONGS AND NOBODY UNDERSTANDS! the percussion section at the beginning after each "look down" is breathtaking! oh oh oh AND did you know that the unfinished words of Eponine and Gavroche are combined to make "grow up"? Eponine dies before she can finish the line "a little fall of rain will make the flowers (dies) grow", and Gavroche dies before he finishes "when the pup grows (dies) up". It's not super deep, but i still have a soft spot for this. and and and and you made an incredible point about the women motif. and and and and and the lighting design is stunning in this concert version, the moving bats are chefs kiss