Creepy Classical Music Part 2

It’s October – which means it’s time for Halloween! What better way to do celebrate than by listening to some spooky music? Check out part 1 here, and get ready to hear some more super creepy classical music.

Der Vampyr by Heinrich Marschner (1795-1861)

If you think today’s depiction of vampires is scary, let’s go back to the Romantic era opera Der Vampyr (“The Vampire”). Marschner composed the work in the late 1820s, and the first performance in March of 1829 was a hit. The text is based on the short story The Vampyre (1819) by English writer John Polidori (who in turn was inspired by Lord Byron).

*Fun fact: Marschner’s brother-in-law wrote the libretto (a fancy term for the text of an opera) for this opera in 1827. Vampires were very “in” at the time due to the success of the novel Frankenstein! Read more about the background here.

In the story, the Vampire Master grants a newly created vampire a year on earth before being dragged down to eternal hell – under the condition that the new vampire can sacrifice three young ladies before the following midnight. The music is full of chromaticism, drama, and tension to create suspense. If that’s not creepy, then I don’t know what is.

Night on Bald Mountain by Modest Mussorgsky (1839-1881)

Vampires are creepy, but in this case, witches and the devil are much worse. Mussorgsky‘s Night on Bald Mountain depicts the dark ritual of a witches’ sabbath through its intense harmonies and rhythms. His original version was composed in 1867, and although he was happy with the composition, his mentor was not. As a result, Night on Bald Mountain was never performed during Mussorgsky’s lifetime.

Fame Through Rimsky-Korsakov

However, many composers after Mussorgsky arranged his original orchestral work. Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov completed this arrangement in 1886, and it was an immediate success. He said of the composing process for his arrangement:

With Mussorgsky’s material as a basis, I decided to create an instrumental piece by retaining all of [his] best and coherent material, adding the fewest possible interpolations of my own. It was necessary to create a form in which Mussorgsky’s ideas would mould in the best fashion.

The Masque of the Red Death by André Caplet (1878-1925)

Composed in 1890, Caplet‘s Masque of the Red Death for harp and string quartet tells the story of Edgar Allan Poe‘s The Mask of the Red Death. In Poe’s story, a horrible disease called the Red Death killed over half of the subjects in Prince Prospero’s kingdom. To protect the castle, the prince throws a never-ending masquerade ball and welds the doors shut. At the stroke of midnight, the music stops and attention is drawn to a guest dressed as a victim of the Red Death. The prince rushes to attack but falls dead before he reaches the masquerader. And as it turns out, the Red Death costume is not hiding anyone – the Red Death itself has come to the party, and slowly all of the guests die from the disease.

The harp and the strings create eerie and chilling sounds to build an atmosphere of terror. The work opens with long, hushed notes in the strings as the harp plays short, intense, ascending triplets. Caplet also incorporates many unique instructions to enhance the ethereal mood. Strings incorporate glissandi and sul ponticello playing (which means they bow really close to the bridge), and the harpist knocks on the harp itself to announce midnight. It’s goosebump-inducing.

The Devil’s Trill Sonata by Giuseppe Tartini (1692-1770)

Tartini said of the final piece in today’s post:

One night, in the year 1713 I dreamed I had made a pact with the devil for my soul. Everything went as I wished: my new servant anticipated my every desire. Among other things, I gave him my violin to see if he could play. How great was my astonishment on hearing a sonata so wonderful and so beautiful, played with such great art and intelligence, as I had never even conceived in my boldest flights of fantasy. I felt enraptured, transported, enchanted: my breath failed me, and I awoke. I immediately grasped my violin in order to retain, in part at least, the impression of my dream. In vain! The music which I at this time composed is indeed the best that I ever wrote, and I still call it the “Devil’s Trill”, but the difference between it and that which so moved me is so great that I would have destroyed my instrument and have said farewell to music forever if it had been possible for me to live without the enjoyment it affords me.

The four-movement sonata is Tartini’s attempt to recreate the music from his dream. The first movement is gentle and reflective with a beautifully lyrical melody. The second movement is full of energetic trills and large leaps. The third movement is short and sweet – literally – before leading into a fiery finale. (In fact, some argue that the third movement is just an extended introduction of the fourth movement.) The last movement is full of virtuosic violin writing. Listen to the cadenza beginning at 13:08!

Not only is the Devil’s Trill sonata extremely difficult to play, but it is also one of Tartini’s best works. Is it a coincidence that his work about the devil is his best composition?

*Side note: Tartini claimed he composed this sonata in 1713, but scholars believe he actually wrote it as late as the 1740s due to its mature style.

What other creepy classical music would you add to this list?