“Save a Horse” has been used (Adrienne Lyle, if I remember correctly), Snowy River was used by Shelly Francis, John Dunbar’s theme used in several lower level rides, Lawrence of Arabia used primarily for Arabian horses doing freestyles.
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You can do a search on song names and/or artist names in youtube, along with keywords like “Dressage Freestyle” and you might come up with at least a partial record of what’s out there. Obviously, that’s only if it’s been recorded and loaded to the site. But it’s a good place to start for those curious whether their idea is an entirely original one.
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I enjoy 80s music and 80s music remixes, so I’ve done a Stevie Nicks/house remix freestyle for 4th level, a Toto/Elton John combo for 3rd level, and Daft Punk for I-1 freestyle. I’m hoping to revamp the Stevie Nicks for next year for a different horse. I have playlists on youtube with different music that think fits. Then it’s very accessible to see what works with my horse when I go to design the freestyle. I’ve always wanted something that the audience can get into and relate to. My hope is to one day have a GP freestyle where everyone is clapping along! I have seen a lot of freestyles that use soundtracks as background music. They’re nice, but not exciting. There was an Irish drum music freestyle that was fantastic. I think if you find some lesser used soundtracks like “The Goonies” or something creative it’d be fun and enjoyable!
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I did an I-1 freestyle many years ago to Jesus Christ Superstar songs. Everything’s Alright for trot, the title song for pirouettes, King Herods song (if you are the Christ) for the rest of canter, and walk was Gethesemane. Quite sure I haven’t come across that again lol.
I was cleaning out old show clothes - opened a top hat box and there were the cassettes 
(shows you how old they were)
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In the 2019 World Cup qualifiers, several competitors used music from Gladiator and at least one used parts of Uptown Funk. One also used Harry Potter (went really well with the horse though!).
Aww, man, I’ve always wanted to do one to Uptown Funk, but figured it would work better with upper levels… I’ll have to see if I can find that one. 
Right, and other songs named such as Save a Horse, and lots of Hip Hop and Rap beats, match the beats of the piaffe and the passage. So, upper-level use only. That is, IF the music is set to match the footfalls.
It is not mandatory that the footfalls of each gait match the beat of the music. But it’s the recommendation of the governing bodies, in the “how to” directives. And, it’s what the vast majority of judges are looking for.
It’s also the goal of most Freestyle designers to match footfalls, so the more professional and experienced ones will set the music precisely to the footfalls by synching the edits to a video of the pair performing the entire choreography. It’s put together in exactly the way a sound editor and composer will score a movie. The choreography is decided first, ridden, videoed, sent to the designer, and then the music is put to the video.
Again matching footfalls is not exactly mandatory. There was a popular video of a rider performing her entire Freestyle to one song, an instrumental cover ( I think?) of Sound of Silence, and it was not matching the footfalls but was instead more like an interpretive contemporary dance and it was beautiful. But not all judges embraced it so there’s a risk in not selecting separate pieces for walk, trot, canter, and piaffe/passage, and in ignoring the common concept of distinct musical phrases for the movements within those gaits.
The intro music in particular doesn’t really need to match the gait, so if someone wanted to trot or canter down centerline for their entry to, for example, the Save a Horse piece, it could work just fine. The intro should set the tone and get attention and be exciting and interesting. So in that way Save a Horse could work for a Freestyle at lower levels with a working trot entry, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s been used that way.
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Jackie Brooks from Canada did the GP freestyle to Sounds of Silence. It was beautiful, and memorable. But a lot of judges aren’t comfortable on the artistic side, and so rely on tempo as to whether the music “suits” the horse or not.
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I believe it was Juan Matute, Jr. He only had it for his final piaffe / passage line.
I think the Sound of Silence freestyle you’re referring to was a GP freestyle done at Dressage at Devon in 2017. It was with words, but a cover of the original. I actually thought it was pretty moving and beautiful, but obviously it’s much more dramatic under the bright lights at a venue like that. Not sure it would carry the same vibe at a regular show.
I have spent so much time at the gym or stuck in traffic having freestyle fantasies to songs. Would love to do a Beach Boys freestyle with my palomino when we’re far enough up the levels to justify it.
The best freestyle I have seen was at the Atlanta 1996 Olympics to the Ghostbusters theme. It was awesome and the audience loved it!
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Sorry, I’m just like majorly shocked that someone from COTH actually listens to/has heard of/likes? Rammstein. But it kind of makes sense with you being a musician and all. Just the other day my mom said they were more of a “musician’s band”.
Anyway, in my neck of the woods it’s TV/movie show themes. Mostly Disney.
My favorite Freestyle would be Edward Gal and Lingh’s 2004 Dusseldorf performance:
https://youtu.be/lCIqzDcOHNw
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I’m quite sure she also did a Freestyle with some “Holla Back Girl” from Gwen Stefani at Devon…year 2007 maybe? It was really cool and I enjoyed it immensely! I like that she’s very open to different music genres.
I personally havs trouble “feeling” it for a trot just because it has a strong feeling of 4 and the trot is 2 beat. I agree it could work for a canter.
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I can’t believe I’m admitting this, but my dad used to create the music for me and my sister when we…competed in…synchronized swimming. The part about Dad creating mixes is cool - the sport? Not so much! Dad was never into rock, so we performed to a lot of fun but older music. I’ll have to ask him today when we talk, but off the top of my head, Henry Mancini seemed to show up with regularity. Baby Elephant Walk, Peter Gun, Tijuana Taxi…not sure about footfalls, but it’s bouncy, happy music!
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I have always dreamt about doing a freestyle to Rammstein, but I think I’d need to be on a big moving German horse and not my choppy little Irish mare!!
As it happens, I had to sell my ticket to see them live on Saturday night just gone as I was competing at a British Dressage Freestyle Gala evening - so I was dressed up as Dumbo, riding a horse called Dumbo doing a freestyle to… you guessed it! :lol: - while my husband, parents and sister were all seeing Rammstein live 45 minutes away :eek:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NfR1vYTge0
I think a lot of Disney music has been overdone but this music has actually really grown on me!
I am going to post here, although I am probably much older than most of you. But I became a BIG fan of freestyles back in 1982. I was able to see the World Championships that year in Lausanne Switzerland. There was an exhibition ride by Christopher Bartles on a horse to Walk in the Black Forest. This ride was at the Prix St. George level. I do not remember the horse’s name, but I believe he rode that horse at Badminton 3-day event, and also took him to Grand Prix in Dressage. (Remember too Chris Bartle happened to be the coach of the German 3-day team at the rise of Germany as an incredible force in the last decade, and he is now back home coaching the British team, which also seems to be on an upward trajectory at the mo, but I digress…)
I am very passionate about music. Very much so. After I saw that ride, I went home to my Training-first level horse and worked out a pretty nice Kur. We did ride it, once, but I do not remember if we were judged or if it was HDC. We were never terribly talented, but the judge made nice comments on my ride. It was one of the few highlights of my riding life.
I was disappointed in the rides at the last Olympics, and of course, disappointed there was no ride last year, but the music for a successful freestyle seems to me to need popular music. I do not go to the movies often, but I have a long list of movie music from the past that I love and listen to regularly. And yes, almost always, when I listen to ANY music, I think of the footfalls.
You all have listed some really good ones, the video of the pinto mare going to music by Ennio Morricone is really good. He is a great movie composer, one of my favorites. Elmer Bernstein is another. Think Magnificent Seven, Great Escape, To Kill a Mockingbird. Another piece I really love is the theme from ‘The Big Country’ by Jerome Moross. I don’t know if that could be translated, but it is a stunning piece of music. Carmine Coppola’s music for the Black Stallion is good, and someone has suggested Man From Snowy River.
Vivanne sets up Shop from Chocolat is another wowzer piece, as is Minor Swing. The Main Theme from an old favorite of mine is My Brilliant Career. It is a classical piece, I think it is called of distant land and people(?)
In case you are wondering, the ride I did so many years ago was to the second movement of Beethoven’s 9th symphony. I am not clever enough to find a link to that movement, but I first heard it many years ago in the movie, a Clockwork Orange. (Movie was a horror show, but had sensational music.)
I’ve never done a musical freestyle before, but I feel like I’ve had rides that should have been accompanied by Yakity Sax!
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One of my favourites recently is this gorgeous ride by Shelly Francis and Danilo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sknVXhfJhzk
The music is so sweet and whimsical and fun and incorporates some great well known songs.
I started doing freestyles 15 or so years (and three horses) ago, and the standard for music editing over time has increased dramatically. Unless you have the skill and patience to use Audacity or another program to do your edits, you need a professional. We have an excellent, very reasonably-priced MFS designer here in Virginia, and my 2019 First Level freestyle cost around $800, and it has mostly scored in the 70’s at licensed shows. After a few shows, we fine tuned the choreography to increase the difficulty and to address some of the common themes in the judges’ comments. That gets expensive, but if you are going to spend the money, why not make it as good as possible?
I am lucky, my trainer is a big MFS supporter, so anyone who is even slightly interested, gets “roped into,” doing one. It’s really tough to find music that hasn’t been over-used. Here is a list of our barn’s greatest hits:
- FEI MFS to Bond (the diamond commercial music)
- FEI MFS to David Bowie (Fame, Under Pressure, and I can’t remember the other)
- Third Level - Pirates of the Caribbean
- Third Level (Piano Guys)
- Second Level (Top Gun, Boys of Summer, Roy Orbison’s You’ve Lost that Loving Feeling)
- First Level (Queen Don’t Stop Me, Somebody to Love and Another one Bites the Dust)
- First Level (Beatles’ medley)
I am seeing more use of original vocals than in year’s past. That can work well, but has its risks.
