The reflectivity method used for the calculation of synthetic seismograms for a layered elastic Earth is modified for the case where the stack of layers is inclined with respect to the free surface. The application of appropriate coordinate transforms and a stationary phase approximation results in a solution that holds if shot point and receivers are not in the vicinity of the area of outcrop and if multiple reflections between free surface and layers are excluded. The method is applied to a simple synthetic example which demonstrates that downdipping reflectors can drastically reduce the critical amplitudes in comparison to horizontal layering. A further application of the method concerns refraction data from the area of the German deep continental drilling location (Oberpfalz) where dripping layers revealed in the reflection section require their incorporation in the wide-angle modelling. ¿ American Geophysical Union 1988