- "There is a new theme for Yoda, the teacher of the Jedi Knights. His theme begins in a kind of piquant way and then develops into a more profound, more noble piece."
- ―John Williams
Yoda's Theme is a recurring musical theme in the Star Wars saga, composed by John Williams and associated with Jedi Master Yoda.
It was first used in the scenes on Dagobah in The Empire Strikes Back, as well as during the hallway shootout scenes on Cloud City. In Return of the Jedi it is used when Luke Skywalker revisits a dying Yoda.
The theme returns briefly near the end of the The Phantom Menace, in which Yoda discusses the future of Anakin Skywalker with Obi-Wan Kenobi. In Attack of the Clones, the leitmotif is heard more often: first during the scene where Yoda is training the Bear Clan, the conveyor belt sequence in the Geonosian droid factory, and finally when Yoda saves Obi-Wan and Anakin from a pillar toppled by Count Dooku. In Revenge of the Sith, it is played when Yoda leaves Kashyyyk, when he escapes with Bail Organa after his duel with Darth Sidious, and in a deleted scene in which Yoda arrives on Dagobah.
The theme is reused in The Last Jedi, when Yoda's spirit appears to Luke and encourages him to learn from his failure with Kylo Ren.
The theme is played in The Rise of Skywalker when Luke Skywalker lifted his Red Five X-wing and during the celebration of victory against the First Order, in the "Reunion track."
A more dramatic, fast-paced variant of the main motif is heard during Yoda's duel with Count Dooku in Attack of the Clones. This version is used in Star Wars: Battlefront II as Yoda's theme when he is played as a "Hero" unit. Pieces of the motif in the track "Carbon Freeze/Darth Vader's Trap" play in LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy on the Cloud City level.
The theme appears several times in the TV series Star Wars: The Clone Wars. It first appears in Ambush, which featured Yoda as the main character; and in Assassin, when Ahsoka Tano tells Yoda about her visions of Padmé.
Yoda's leitmotif transitions to "Ahsoka's Theme," with which "Yoda's Theme" shares its opening notes, in the Forces of Destiny episode "Teach You, I Will," as Yoda teaches Ahsoka Tano to stay true to herself.
A snippet of the theme was used by Ludwig Göransson in the score for The Mandalorian. A brief section of it is played in the 2020 episode "Chapter 13: The Jedi," when Ahsoka Tano describes once having known a being of Grogu's kind. The theme appears again in The Book of Boba Fett, also scored by Göransson, when Luke Skywalker speaks about Yoda.
Sources[]
- Once Upon a Galaxy: A Journal of the Making of The Empire Strikes Back
- The Secrets of Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire
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