A soundtrack is the audible soul of a story, bringing unseen but tangible emotions to life. And there’s only one thing more satisfying than when a film or television adaptation seamlessly matches the experience of a read: when its soundtrack truly captures and deepens that experience. When a beloved classic is combined with the perfect composers, something sacred happens within an audience member’s heart. It constricts and beats in rhythm with the songs. It starts and stops in time with the action on screen. If you love films like Pride and Prejudice or Jane Eyre, you’re probably eager to know what series are available with all the same dramatic and romantic feels.
Here is a shortlist of some of the best matched period drama series and scores. Now you can nerd out even harder with the novels you know and love.
1. The Poldark Series
Composer: Anne Dudley
First published between 1945 and 1953, twelve novels make up Winston Graham’s historical drama. This series details the trials of Ross Poldark, American War veteran, and his family in Cornwall, UK during the late 1700s. Love triangles, war, poverty, and the strain of proprietary life: all the best trappings of a great drama.
Soft and slow musings of coastal life in the eighteenth century, UK. melancholy melodies relaying the hardships of upper and lower class alike. The upbeat theme spurs in time with the spinning spokes of a carriage, or horses hooves, carrying the viewer from one protagonist’s adventure to the next. All pieces in this collection, whether instrumental or humble country limericks, sing of impermanence. The circle of life is like the tide appearing and retreating, crashing upon the cliffs of Nampara Cove.
2. North and South
Composer: Martin Phipps
Elizabeth Gaskell’s most popular novel tells of eighteen year old, Margaret Hale, and her family’s relocation from her quaint country home of Helstone for the Northern city, Milton. As her family adjusts to their new life, Margaret discovers the harsh conditions of the cotton factory, Marlborough Mills. She befriends those employed there and comes to abhor the cruel man who oversees them. Little does she realize just how well she will come to know this John Thornton.
True to the popular instruments of the time, this soundtrack is mainly comprised of piano and strings. Each track boasts a slow and steady crescendo akin to the rise in tragedy and conflict, or the bobbing and weaving of a cotton needle. A heavyweight is held in these despondent songs, like a layer of dust resting on the lungs of factory workers. And yet, quick, flitting notes, as of a bird taking flight, attest to the existence of hope and love in even the gloomiest circumstances.
3. Penny Dreadful
Composer: Abel Korzeniowski
Not based solely on any one “penny dreadful,” this series interweaves four main classic horrors: The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson, Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, and Bram Stoker’s Dracula.
Though these varied novels merge to create one dark and often terrifying amalgamation, this lurid soundtrack also captures fragments of light and humanity. By showcasing both modern cinematic style tracks and a dissonance that creates fitting discomfort, this eery compilation touches on the pain and tenderness that exists behind every horror.
4. The Complete Sherlock Holmes
Composer: David Arnold and Michael Price
At four novels and fifty-six short stories, the complete collection of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes mysteries makes up the largest series on this list. This master of deductive reasoning rose to fame in the late 1800s, and to this day he remains the masses most memorable and favorite detective.
As this series adaptation takes a modern spin on these famous nineteenth-century mysteries, so does its score. The unique relationship between an intellectual vigilante and his journalistic sidekick is bared in a wide range of moods. The violin is a staple amongst these songs; ranging from the jaunty echoes of hot pursuit to the ramblings of busy London streets to the somber and lackadaisical lamentations of the open country. You can almost smell the incessant rain.
5. The Outlander Series
Composer: Bear McCreary
A modern classic by Diana Gabaldon. This historical drama details the unorthodox journey of Claire Randall, a WWII nurse mysteriously transported from her life in 1945 to Scotland, the year 1743. There, her path intersects with that of Jamie Fraser, a Highland warrior. Returning home is no easy feat.
A magical blend of traditional Scottish instrumentals is arranged in a mix of accordion, bagpipe and harp. Lively folk dances and the thrum of steady marches inspire the feel of an unknown journey infused with passion. The historical and fantastical merge as malevolent notes that sweep listeners away to another time, just as Claire is swept from her own by the lure of strange magic.
It’s intriguing how the rise and fall of sound, the lift and lulls in octaves, can cut to the core… of the viewer or listener’s heart, and of the lifeblood that these novels already swell with.
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