Survive - Stranger Things Theme | Melody MIDI Remake

Remaking the melody from the 2016 song "Stranger Things Theme" by Survive can be a great way to understand how the music you love is made. Here’s how you can build the "Stranger Things Theme" melody yourself, exploring it directly here in the browser via our embedded DAW below. Listen to the original, then follow the recipe step by step.

Original Audio

One arpeggio carries the entire Stranger Things theme, and it never rests. It’s a C major 7 chord walking up one octave and walking back down, looped without a break for the whole title sequence. Nothing about the figure is frightening on its own. The dread comes from repetition: the same notes cycling flat and machine-even until a pretty major chord starts to feel like a warning thanks to the shifting root underneath courtesy of the bass. Survive scored it in the John Carpenter tradition of synth horror, with one tireless pattern that carries the tonal load.

Our Remake of The Melody

This audio clip is how close we've matched the original notes and MIDI melody from the song "Stranger Things Theme" by Survive.

Challenge Yourself

Can you recreate the notes and rhythm by ear? Try it now in this interactive challenge where you'll enter notes into a real in-browser DAW. Hit "Start Challenge", and follow the steps that appear.

Can't figure it out? Scroll down for the MIDI Recipe and our DAW recreation.

MIDI Notes Recipe

The spec

• Key: C major
• Tempo: 84 BPM
• Time signature: 4/4
• Feel: Straight 16th notes, no rests. A constant machine pulse.
• Loop: An 8-note arp shape, twice per bar, identical every bar.
• Register: Arp one octave, C4 to C5.
• Bass: Three notes moving under the fixed arp: C2, D2, E2.

What makes it work

• The arp never changes. The whole melody is a Cmaj7 arpeggio (C E G B) climbed to the octave and walked back: C E G B C B G E, twice a bar, no breaks, no variation.
• The bass shapes the harmony. One frozen arp, three bass notes underneath (C, then D, then E). Same notes on top, re-colored each time the bass moves. All the tonal shifting you hear is the bass walking up, not the melody.
• All pitch, no rhythm. Every note is a 16th, every note equal. Nothing to learn in the rhythm. The tension is the fixed climb over a rising floor.

The arp

One bar. Every 16th plays a note, so the 8-note shape lands twice. Every bar is identical.

The bass

Three long notes under the arp. This is the only thing that moves.

Build it

In the player below:

1. Clear the current notes (erase button, bottom-left).
2. Own DAW? Set 84 BPM, 4/4. (The player is already set.)
3. Lay a steady 16th stream: one note on every 16th, no gaps.
4. Climb C4 E4 G4 B4 C5, then back down B4 G4 E4. That 8-note shape is the arp.
5. Repeat it to fill the bar, then copy the bar across. No variation.
6. Add the bass: three long notes underneath. C2 on bar 1, a quick D2 on beat 4 of bar 2, then E2 on bar 3. Let each ring.
7. Stay flat: every arp note the same length and volume. The evenness is the hypnosis.

Make it yours

• Move the bass, freeze the arp: keep the arp locked and walk the bass somewhere else. New harmony, same hypnosis. That is the whole trick.
• Change the arp chord: run the same up-and-down motion through a different seventh chord (try A minor 7 or F major 7); the mood shifts, the pulse holds.
• Keep it machine-locked: dead on the 16th grid, flat on velocity. The moment it breathes, it stops being unsettling.
• Build the sound: the plucked tone is on Syntorial → Stranger Things Theme Pluck Preset Recipe.

DAW Recreation

Check out the notes yourself below in this embedded DAW. Play it, edit it, make it your own!

Explore More

• The story behind the Stranger Things theme, told by its composers (Roland)
• Scoring Stranger Things: how Kyle Dixon and Michael Stein built it (Sound on Sound)
• How to Play the Stranger Things Arpeggio (YouTube)
• Recreating the Stranger Things theme, step by step (Splice)
• How to Program the “Stranger Things” Arpeggio (YouTube)