Scariest Classical Music

I have been making a number of short films lately and my next is going to have a very dark tone. I am looking for music that is unnerving, atmospheric and spooky. I have used alot of Bartok in the past but I am looking for some alternatives and am currently leaning more towards atonal music. I have started listening to Penderecki, but I don't know much about his works, so some recommendations would be nice.

So, what is/are the scariest piece(s) of classical music that you know?

Thanks!

George Crumb, BLACK ANGELS

I wouldnt say this is scary to me, I think it is just soo cool a quite beautiful but it was used in the Exorcist so there has got to be some scare factor

lol Chris

Bruckner 9 has some rreeeeeaaaaallllly scary stuff in it.

Saint-Saens - Danse Macabre

Beethoven - Piano Sonata in D-Minor No. 17 Op. 31-2, "Tempest" (1st and 3rd movements)

Beethoven - Piano Sonata in F-Minor No. 23 Op. 57, "Appassionata" (1st and 3rd movements)

Beethoven - Symphony No. 7 in A-Major, (2nd movement)

Mozart - Requiem in Dm (K.626) esp. Confutatis

Orff - Carmina Burana

I agree with JMay, on what might not be the most obvious choice: Mozart's Requiem...some really terrifying bits in that. Mainly the Rex Tremendae, and Confutatis and Dies Irae.

How about the start of the development of the 4th movement of Mozart's 40th symphony?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qg5sA4T9xO0#t=1m43s

That movement in general...

The opening of the 'Dissonance' quartet is creepy.

You might be interested in the works of Shostakovich. The violin and cello concertos are a good place to start. Not quite atonal, but creepy nonetheless.

agreed. The 2nd Cello concerto, and then the 2nv movement. And the way that theme returns in the finale. Terrifying...

Varese: Déserts

Penderecki: Threnody, Anaklasis

Tsontakis: Ghost Variations

David Gordon: Friction Systems

There's a lot out there!

A few, youtube links, save ya the trouble.

Good song about death.

Obviously...

Prokofiev's famous Suggestion Diabolique

Two pieces that show Rachmaninoff's darker side...

Rachmaninoff - Symphonic Dance No.2

I find this one a mixture of beautiful and creepy personally.

Blumenfeld - Etude de concert in F sharp minor, Op.24

I agree about Jmay's suggestion of Danse Macabre as well as Dominus Vobiscum's suggestion Toccata and Fugue.

Xenakis - Keqrops (beginning)

Many works by the Italian composer Giacinto Scelsi are really creepy.

Xenakis - Keqrops (beginning)

Many works by the Italian composer Giacinto Scelsi are really creepy.

I have never heard of Xenakis, but I looked him up and he sounds amazing. Great suggestion

Schnittke's Pianissimo.

Verdi's Requiem. Namely "Dies irae" and "Tuba mirum"

Second on that Psycho soundtrack. COMPLETELY freaked me out when I heard it in my music theory class. Also a second on Danse Macabre. That piece is just awesome on the organ. Also consider Shostakovich Quartet no. 8

- The famously lazy Anatol Lyadov managed to finish a couple of pieces you might find a use for - Baba Yaga and Kikimora (both about Russian witches, the former is the same witch as in Mussiorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition)

- Holst - Egdon Heath

- Richard Strauss - An Alpine Symphony (particularly the opening and the storm sequence, there are some pretty happy bits elsewhere)

- Rite of Spring

- Sibelius - Tapiola (getting lost in a Nordic forest is not a good idea when there's a storm brewing); Overture from The Tempest (too late, the storm is already here)

- Mahler symphonies Five and Six, especially the finale with the hammer blows

Gyorgy Ligety's opera .....le grand macabre (over 18's only!!!!)

Rite of Spring was the first piece to really get me all weirded out. The Threnody's pretty intense. Fantomas's long-form work was pretty brutal. Some of Ekkehard Ehlers's blues album was really intense too...

Course the scariest thing I ever heard was the record of the Jonestown Massacre. Gross.

Charles Ives Piano Sonata No.2

You might wanna check some of J. Sibelius's more dark-atmosphered works, such as the second part of the Lemminkäinen suite

(

) and some parts of En Saga. Some of Debussey's works are pretty chilling as well, although I do not have any specific one in my mind right now. If you don't mind having a piece with a singr and lyrics, I'd warmly recommend Leevi Madetoja's "Syksy", which pretty much chilled me to the bone... :wacko:

If music scares you, you aren't listening to it correctly.

.............? :blink:

I'm just wondering what definitions of "scare", "music", "listening" and "correctly" you are using to cobble that sentence together.

I often come across views I disagree with, and sometimes views I don't understand... but rarely statements that I can't even begin to see how they are arrived at, and yet presented in such a consice manner as to appear a dogmatic, self-evident truth!

I believe that music does not have any inherent emotion; I believe our perceptions of emotion in music are as a result of our societal conditioning which really isn't anyone's fault but does a disservice to some of the greater depths of music that isn't emotional.

"The aim of music is not to express feelings but to express music. It is not a vessel into which the composer distills his soul drop by drop, but a labyrinth with no beginning and no end, full of new paths to discover, where mystery remains eternal." — Pierre Boulez (attributed)

When my clock radio goes off in the morning, I can tell you I am momentarily terrified - or am I not listening to it properly?

I also think Boulez is a prick.

I do not, however, think Stravisky and Copland are pricks, so this needs a serious reply :phones:

It's interesting that you expect us to look for someone to be at "fault" for social conditioning. It's a harsh-sounding phrase but it means "learning". To say: "our perceptions of emotion in music are as a result of our societal conditioning", means "we learn how to react emotionally to music" - which is obvious. I don't see why this is a bad thing.

But anyway, your argument rests on the assertion that social conditioning is distracting our appreciation of music, but I can't think of a single thing that cuts through the niceties of civilized culture, quite as well as fear.

And I am very dubious of quotes that begin with "The aim of music is...".

Can we start a new thread on this? It's interesting!

I have a scraggy load of music that fits into this:

Schonberg's "Variationen uber ein Rezitativ, Op. 40" (Hans-Ola Ericsson is beast)

'' Pierrot Lunaire

'' Survivor From Warsaw

Britten's Peter Grimes (go to the scene where he loses his mind it's brilliant)

Prokofiev's 3rd Symphony

Crumb: Star Child (the Dies Irae is unbelievable), Black Angels,

Mosolow(Mosolov): Zavod-brilliant BRILLIANT

Shostakovich Symphony 7 (first movement)

Penderecki Threnody, Cello Concerti

Rite of Spring

Poulenc Sextet

Anything by Sorabji (HOW THE HELL DO YOU PLAY IT? LET ALONE PICK OUT THE BEAT!!!!)

Messiaen Quartet for End of times

gubaidulina's Bassoon Concerto (Bassoon and low Strings-FOURTH MOVEMENT WDF?!?!-Sinfonia Lahti Chamber Ensemble Recording is freaky as hell)

Takemitsu's Soundtrack to "Ran"

Aho's Contrabassoon Concerto :P

Tons of other stuff :P Can I go on?

Gyorgy Ligety's opera .....le grand macabre (over 18's only!!!!)

BRILLIANT OPERA I GET TO SEE IT IN MAY 2010 WITH THE NYPHIL. IS IT NOT BRILLIANT?

George Crumb, BLACK ANGELS

I wouldnt say this is scary to me, I think it is just soo cool a quite beautiful but it was used in the Exorcist so there has got to be some scare factor

Unknowingly having my speakers turned up while clicking on that link certainly gave me a scare!