As we move into the twilight of the year, the glorious sepia tones of autumn usher in a season of delightful spooks and scares. It's only right that we have the appropriate soundtrack to accompany us on our haunted journey! Whether that happens to be through an eerie wood in search of a witch’s gingerbread house, traipsing the grounds of a creepy castle, or braving the daily commute through New England’s precipitous and often wildly variable weather, the classical world provides. Let’s explore some of these spooky seasonal offerings together!
Franz Schubert: Erlkönig
It’s the tale of a father and son trying to outrun the fearsome Erlking (whose touch brings death!), based on an epic poem by one of the most famous German writers out there, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Schubert’s take is a masterful combination of voice and piano – the tenor alternating between four parts: father and son, narrator, and Erlking, while the piano creates the entire world they run through. Devilishly difficult (pun intended!) to perform for both musicians, baritone Konstantin Krimmel and pianist Ammiel Bushakevitz handle it masterfully.
The piece has captured the imaginations of many a musician over the years, on many an instrument – check out Hilary Hahn playing all four roles PLUS the accompaniment as a violin solo!
Paul Dukas: The Sorcerer’s Apprentice
Home to one of the most recognizable bassoon melodies ever, many of us associate this one with a mischievous rodent and troublesome broomstick –- Disney’s Fantasia (1940) put Mickey Mouse squarely in the title role and helped make the piece famous far beyond the realm of the concert hall. Dukas’s piece was based on another poem by that German wizard of words, Goethe, and Disney’s version stays true to the original magical tail… er, tale, that is. Check out the Detroit Symphony Orchestra led by Jader Bignamini. The build-up starting at 8:20 will give you chills!
Joe Hisaishi: Merry Go-Round of Life
We head over to the movies for a modern classic and complete delight: Joe Hisaishi’s soundtrack to Miyazaki’s Howl’s Moving Castle (2004). Re-watching the mis-adventures of our heroine Sophie as she meets the wizard Howl, runs afoul of a few witches, saves a prince, and keeps up with a feisty fire demon has become a yearly fall tradition for me and my friends. Here’s a sweet treat from the movie, the beautiful waltz “Merry-Go-Round of Life”, with Hisaishi himself at the piano and leading the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra:
If chillier, aquatic hauntings are more your taste, have I got a pair for you, starting with a dark Czechoslovakian legend.
Antonín Dvořák: Vodník
Also based on a poem (this time by Dvořák’s fellow countryman Karel Jaromír Erben), The Water Goblin is his take on a chilling folktale of a water demon whose favorite pastimes include pipe smoking, drowning the unwary, and capturing their souls in teacups. The full story starts with the kidnapping of a bride-to-be and (a warning for the squeamish) ends with the discovery of a decapitated head. Fans of the book Scary Stories to Read in the Dark will find this one right up their alley.
Richard Wagner: Der fliegende Holländer
Our second watery yarn takes place upon the high seas, with that most famous of ghost ships, The Flying Dutchman. No, we won’t be jamming out to Han Zimmer’s Pirates of the Caribbean soundtrack this time around, but instead play duck-and-cover with the epic waves and splashes of the overture to Wagner’s opera Der fliegende Holländer. The ship’s fearsome captain must find true love in order to release his ship, his crew, and himself from an eternal spectral existence. Here’s Sir George Solti in full command of his orchestral crew, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra:
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Don Giovanni
The world of opera has long taken advantage of the spectacle offered by ghost stories. This one treats the audience to the tale of a playboy who, after seducing yet another young woman, murders her father! After continuing on his dissolute path, our title character eventually gets his comeuppance when [spoilers!] the murdered father’s vengeful spirit returns to drag Giovanni into the depths of hell. The overture ominously hints at what’s to come, but the ghostly Commendatore doesn’t appear until the very end, condemning Donny G for his lecherous ways and giving him one last chance to repent, before dragging the unremorseful Don to his eternal end. Check out the overture, with Riccardo Muti leading the Vienna State Opera through some severely fore-shadowy chords, before skipping ahead to the final confrontation between Don Giovanni and the grim spectre of the dead Commendatore:
Engelbert Humperdinck: Hansel and Gretel
Let’s check out one more opera - this one home to tricks AND treats! Based on the Brothers Grimm fairy tale, two children lost in the woods find a house made of gingerbread and start munching away only to find themselves captured by the witch whose home they’ve nibbled upon. Hear how Humperdinck creates the Witch’s Ride in this prelude to the second act:
William Bolcom: Graceful Ghost Rag
A calmer spirit joins us now for a respite from all the haunted hooligans. It’s the first of William Bolcom’s three Ghost Rags, written in memory of his father, and the gentle melodies bring a wonderful sense of peace. Here’s Marc-André Hamlin captivating an audience (and any resident ghosts) with ease.
George Fenton: Overture from High Spirits (1988)
Sometimes it is best just to let the ghoulies take matters into their own hands, transparent though they might be. The comic movie High Spirits (1988) illustrates this boo-tifully: 1) Take an impoverished hotel owner with a decrepit castle falling down around his ears who decides to attract tourists by claiming it to be haunted. 2) Add said tourists with a variety of love triangles plus some resident ghosts with a few ideas of their own, and 3) shenanigans ensue! George Fenton’s soundtrack accompanies the silly, serious, and romantic hauntings, and his overture captures the mad-cap antics of humans and ghosts alike with great aplomb.
John Williams: Devil’s Dance, from The Witches of Eastwick (1987)
Part of Williams’s score to the movie The Witches of Eastwick (Cher, Susan Sarandon, AND Michelle Pfeiffer squaring off against Jack Nicholson’s devil? Absolutely wild), the Devil’s Dance was originally a party for the whole orchestra. Eventually, Williams created a special version of it for violin and piano for long-time friend Gil Shaham. Here he is, playing the arrangement dedicated to him, with pianist Jonathan Feldman.
Modest Mussorgsky: Night on Bald Mountain
We turn back to Disney’s Fantasia (1940) for our penultimate haunting, this time courtesy of Mussorgsky’s Night on Bald Mountain. He supposedly wrote it in one night in his mid-twenties, inspired by tales of a witches’ sabbath aligned with the summer solstice. Unfortunately, his teacher Mily Balakirev didn’t like it, so Mussorgsky tried to recycle it into various projects over the years with varying degrees of success. It wasn’t until after he died and his colleague Rimsky-Korsakov re-orchestrated it that the piece emerged from the darkness into the light of the concert hall, much as the work leads the petrified listener through a musically tumultuous night before ending with the clear light of dawn. Here’s Markus Stenz and the Radio Philharmonic Orchestra with the supernatural journey:
Giuseppe Verdi: Dies Irae from Messa di Requiem
One last number in this cavalcade of the musically macabre - the Dies Irae from Verdi’s Requiem. I first heard it on a blustery October day, barreling down the highway with pumpkin spice latte in hand, thinking, “This is it. This is peak Halloween.” Hold on to your hats as Semyon Bychkov, the BBC Symphony Orchestra, and the combined forces of the BBC Symphony Chorus, the BBC National Chorus of Wales, and the London Philharmonic Choir blow the lid off the Royal Albert Hall:
Warning: author not responsible for any speeding that may occur if driving while listening!
Want more spooky hits? Check out our Danse Macabre: Terrifying Tales from Classical Music History from a few years back, Classical in Cartoons: Disney's "The Skeleton Dance", or a past October edition of Instant Replay for all your haunted listening needs!
