Awesome Music / Les Misérables

• "One Day More" vindicates all the earlier, simpler songs in the musical by having them play at the same time. Why was the melody of "Master of the House" so simple and straightforward? So that it would work as counterpoint with "I Dreamed a Dream" and "Look Down"!
  • Valjean's belting of "One Day More!" as each part comes together near the end. Then the entire cast comes together again to sing the final lines in unison. There's a reason it's one of the most famous Act I finales in musical theater.
  • "Morgen Schon", the German translation of "One Day More" on the Viennese cast recording, may be even more gorgeous than any English recording.
• "Javert's Suicide". The recitative before the song: The man of mercy comes again, then talks of justice!/Our time is running short! Look down, Javert, he's standing in his grave.... The callback to "Look Down". The stezza on "justice". Chills. Every time. And as for the actual song... Well, where do you start? "...The world I have known is lost in shadows..." The lyrics, oh the lyrics! Stunning. And the last part... the way Javert's descent off the railing of the bridge is timed with the held sung-screamed last note will make anyone emotional.
• The reprise of "Do You Hear the People Sing" in the 10th Anniversary Concert. Seventeen Valjeans singing in their native languages. There's Awesome Music and a Moment of Awesome in one. The one in the regular show isn't anything to sneeze at either.
• Stars is knock-you-backwards amazing. The staging - perfect! The melody - beautiful! And the lyrics! How anyone can perfectly show all sides of a character as complex as Javert in about three minutes defies description. It takes real talent to show how someone is a submissive servant of justice, a shining-with-self-righteous-zealotry Knight Templar, a Determinator hunter of that darn fugitive who keeps slipping through his fingers, and a Well-Intentioned Extremist who truly wants to do what's right but just goes way, way too far just through one song. And applause for the brilliantly chosen symbolism and imagery.
• "I Dreamed A Dream". Angst has never sounded so fucking awesome.
• Master Of The House is insanely catchy, funny, is the most cheerful song in the musical despite being a villain song and is just a whole lot of fun.
• "Bring Him Home". Especially if the singer switches to a faint falsetto for the last two notes.
• Every single note Enjolras sings. He even makes dying at the barricades sound AWESOME. Case in point: "Red and Black". "Red! The blood of angry men! Black! The dark of ages past! Red! A world about to dawn! Black! The night that ends at last!"
  • "With all the anger in the land, how long before the judgement day?! Before we cut the fat ones down to size?! Before the barricades ARISE?!"
• "Little People". Both the short version and the original.
• The transition from the end of 'Waltz of Treachery' into 'Look Down'. The shift in tone of the scene is so incredibly effective and spine-chilling.
• Same with the very short theme playing when Valjean lifts the cart off Monsieur Fauchelevent in 'The Runaway Cart'.
• "On My Own". It can give "I Dreamed A Dream" a run for its money in terms of angst and sorrow.

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