Best Soap Opera Opening

[DRW50]

So many choices I agree with - I love that version of the Search theme, and Brookside's is just iconic. @I Am A Swede I do love that theme. It is a true classic - so much better than what they have now (which I once saw called "carnival music").

 

Crossroads had a great theme - Paul McCartney even did a version! They played it over the credits and everything, more than once. Imagine all those old ladies busy wondering whether Meg would keep the hotel and they hear those electric guitars...

 

Please register in order to view this content

 

 

 

I also love the old Corrie theme, especially the closing credits. Very stirring. Now it sounds like someone recorded inside a bathroom - a bathroom made entirely out of tin.

 

 

[All My Shadows]

I HATE what they've done to the Corrie and Emmerdale themes. EE's current arrangement is decent, but you hit the nail on the head re: Corrie. I also hate how they use the same snippet for break intro/outro instead of the traditional End of Part One/Part Two music. Why go from a nice variety that had been there since the first episode to an annoying, repetitive mess?

Speaking of the British Isles, nothing in the UK can beat Take the High Road's theme, especially with that beautiful, atmospheric midsection in the closing theme.

Please register in order to view this content

 

Edited July 7, 2018 by All My Shadows

[I Am A Swede]

I love the old Coronation Street theme too. It has the same wistful, nostalgic qualities as the old Emmerdale Farm theme.  

Please register in order to view this content

[Cat]

This thread is epic. I've just spent hours watching the different openings, even the shows I never watched before. For me, a nostalgia hound, the oldies are the true goodies: the later revisions tried to make the shows 'modern' but failed to capture the essence of a show imo. Days is an outright classic which should never be touched. Before the days of YouTube, social media and viral marketing, soap openings were the only thing that I as a viewer had to trigger me into watching a show. AMC's pages turning opening may (by some, not me) have been considered 'old fashioned', but to me as a non-regular viewer, it was redolent with this gothic history I knew nothing about. It made me want to know more about a show and its backstory.

 

(I make an exception for GH's Faces of the Heart because it and the show meant so much to me at the time. The opening ambulance theme was GOLD though).

 

Consequently, my fave is Y&R's opening with Nadia's Theme and the line drawings which were somehow unfinished but managed to capture the intensity and beauty of the characters. Unpopular opinion, but the later addition of filmed actors turning to camera made the opening look a little dated. Still 80s Fabulous though.

 

Please register in order to view this content

 

 

B&B's original opening was so gorgeous and glossy, it looked like shots for a fashion magazine. It does not date.

 

 

 

Santa Barbara's opening literally made me tingle with anticipation as a kid.

 

 

 

GL seemed to change its opening every year, huh. I have a particular fondness for the disco theme of the very early 80s lol.

 

If we are talking worst soap openings, I would nominate any that JFP touched in a tacky, tryhard attempt at notional relevance. But that's a subject for another thread...

Edited July 7, 2018 by Cat

[ChitHappens]

Edge of Night

ATWT (88-93)

Another World (Crystal Gayle & Gary Morris)

Ryan's Hope!  

[titan1978]

I love that slow jazz version, and the opening notes of Hold on to Love mirroring the classic theme it replaced in 1991.  Just like when GH went from the ambulance to the Riche era open, the hints of the prior theme music at the beginning of the new theme was a smart way to go for longtime fans.

The only theme I think JFP got right was Guiding Light.  All the rest sucked.

 

DAYS is timeless, but I remember liking the opening notes of the more gothic version that aired during Reilly’s return to the show.  It only aired for a few months, if even that long.  I didn’t want it to replace the other one, I just kind of dig the opening notes.

 

 

[Franko]

Not necessarily best, but here are a few underrated openings:

Splitting the difference between the somber and pop versions of "My Guiding Light":

Please register in order to view this content

 

The little flourish between Susan and Steve's credits is just great:

 

I'd love to hear a full version of this theme:

 

[BetterForgotten]

Let's get this straight - 'Hold On To Love' was Robert Calhoun's contribution to GL, not JFP's. 

Edited July 8, 2018 by BetterForgotten

[YRBB]

You probably can't do any better than Nadia's Theme (with drawings or people, up to 1999). Just timeless, beautiful, classic.

 

(Bonus mention to Jill's epic hair toss from the porn opening).

[titan1978]

I didn’t know that, thanks for clarifying.  For some reason I was under the impression that it first aired during the blackout storyline which was during her tenure as an anniversary celebration.  That’s the problem with watching the show after the fact on YouTube. 

 

 

 Maybe I’m confusing it with GH premiering Faces of the Heart during its 30th anniversary episode.

 

People like Robert Calhoun deserved to keep getting jobs.  Instead people like Goutman, Tomlin and JFP kept ruining shows.

[soapfan770]

I liked AW 1981-87's graphics, but the music was dreadful! I felt the instrumental version of "You Take Me Away..." worked a heck of a lot better but by that point they had cut the opening in half too. 

[Franko]

This might have to be its own thread, but what are some of everyone's favorite moments in opening sequences? I always liked Lynn Herring's raised eyebrow during "Faces of the Heart."

[soapfan770]

 

I enjoyed the slow jazz as well for GL in 1996, just definitely not the cheesy "island" theme they tried out too that sounded far worse than the cheesy pop rock version of "You Take Me Away to Another World". 

 

I remember that 2004 opening well and it was really bizarre, it only play on Melaswen days and with it first playing on Marlena finding Alice alive if I recall right. Then again, 2004 Days was probably with the weirdest, wackiest summer for any soap ever so it's only fitting it stayed there playing during the days of "They're ALL ALIVE!" 

[MichaelGL]

I wish they had kept the 2004 opening theme of DAYS. It was majestic, and sure beats the shortened one we have now. 

In retrospect Y&R's porn opening was pretty good, it just took me years to realize how good it was. 

Not much to add here in the thread, everyone has touched upon what openings are the best. I liked GL's lifesaver opening in the sense it was the last good period of GL, and the openings that followed were absolutely horrible. 

GL's theme from 2005 was underwhelming and sounds like the intro to some daytime talk show. It sounds so generic and uninspired. 

Please register in order to view this content

 

[juppiter]

All these are good.

 

But the hourglass. The orchestral flush. The simplicity. The "sands through the hourglass." The timelessness. Days 1993-present is the best of all time. 

 

And, I mean, how breathtaking is the closing?

 

Please register in order to view this content

 

That's a closing that, in the best of times, made you think that the schlock you just watched was more intelligent TV than it presented itself as, and not just a guilty pleasure, but an institution rooted in deep history, and in the worst of times, made you anticipate that the relentlessly slow pace and idiotic storylines would eventually have a great payoff if you just hung in a little while longer, because a show with this respectable a theme song and half a respectable cast couldn't be as dumb as you thought it just might be deep down.

 

I may be projecting a little here. But the Days theme and opening are magical and always will be, and TPTB should rethink the shortened version, because this theme makes DAYS an institution and I feel it's part of what kept me hanging on at points when I felt the show was disappointing.

 

IDK. It's hard to compare 90s DAYS to now.

 

Edited July 8, 2018 by juppiter