Piano Forum
Piano Board => Repertoire => Topic started by: simonjp90 on October 21, 2009, 12:14:15 AM
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anyone know any really frightening pieces? stuff like the start of prometheus and scarbo ,things that will make you look over your shoulder. .
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'In the Hall of the Mountain King' from Grieg's Peer Gynt Suite always did it in for me when I was a little kid. I heard that on a commercial when I was home alone and it freaked me the hell out.
-Suggestion Diabolique by Prokofiev
-Basso Ostinato by Shchedrin, check out this video of it
according to some comments, it's not played properly, but it sounds pretty cool.
-Rachmaninoff Op 39 #6
-Tausig 'Ghost Ship'
-Chanson de la Folle au Bord de la Mer, Op 31 #8 by Alkan. That's the approximate title, a crazy lady taking a stroll along the beach. Pretty nasty sounding stuff.
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Liszt Dantes sonata. From Annes de pelerinage
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See if there's a two-hand version of the "Night on Bald Mountain" piece by Mussorgsky.
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See if there's a two-hand version of the "Night on Bald Mountain" piece by Mussorgsky.
There is. Tchernov's transcription has been played by many people, notably Berezovsky.
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A lot of Feinberg
Rudepoema by Villa-Lobos
Stockhausen klavierstucke
I also remember hearing a piece by Liszt that was so happy it was scary.
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The first movement of Bartok's piano sonata is pretty scary and unpredictable to the unfamiliar ear. Some of Mosolov's work might also do the trick.
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The first movement of Bartok's piano sonata is pretty scary and unpredictable to the unfamiliar ear. Some of Mosolov's work might also do the trick.
I certainly would consider the 2nd movement of Bartok's "Sonata for 2 Pianos and Percussion". Very eerie sounding, with sudden bursts and strange effects from the perc. Also, LOTs of music of George Crumb, especially Black Angels, but also parts of any of the Makrokosmos - lot's of spooky music there. But I don't recall if you intended to perform or just play the recordings of musical suggestions.
Then there's always this (attached) :o [Effective if suddenly played very loud in a very quiet, spooky situation!]
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Leos Janacek's "Sycek Neodletel" (The little owl continues screeching) N°10 from the book "On the Overgrown Path"
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Ravel in G concerto
last mvt
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The ending of Mahler's 6th makes me almost literally jump out of my seat every single time even though I know it's coming. As for pieces including piano, Martha Argerich said she's never played Beethoven's 4th Concerto because of how much the 2nd movement scared her when she was little. Liszt's Totentanz is pretty scary too.
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The ending of Mahler's 6th makes me almost literally jump out of my seat every single time even though I know it's coming. As for pieces including piano, Martha Argerich said she's never played Beethoven's 4th Concerto because of how much the 2nd movement scared her when she was little. Liszt's Totentanz is pretty scary too.
the third movement would make her feel better
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Leo Ornstein - Suicide in an Airplane
Scriabin - a lot of moments in the later sonatas (in particular 6, 8, 9)
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Mussorgski's The Hut on Fowl's Legs is always fun. Another good one is Ligeti's L'escalier du Diable but it's pretty much not humanely possible and you'd have to appreciate some atonality.
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What about Scriabin's Black Mass?
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Vers La Flamme is pretty scary. Also very difficult.
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Penderecki Cello Concerto. There's a recording by Siegfried Palm on EMI (it was on LP, I don't know for sure that it's been reissued on CD but I'd be surprised if not) which should really not be listened to by the faint-hearted in a dark room!
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Speaking of Penderecki, one of his most famous works from his earlier years is "Threnody, to the Victims of Hiroshima", for 52 string instruments. As the title implies, this work evokes the horror of that fateful, dreadful August morning in 1945. But as I write this I forgot this is a PIANO forum, and I don't believe there's a transcription...
But back to piano works, when I was first discovering Scriabin when I was in my 20's I found his Sonatas #6-#10 each to have a way of conjuring a sense of dread. Scriabin refused to perform #6 in public because he felt it too disturbing. To this day it remains my favorite of the latter group.
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Le Gibet and Scarbo from Ravel's Gaspard de la nuit. Scarbo has moments of frantic terror but in my opinion Le Gibet is far scarier, it's slow, menacing and completely imbued with a sense of utter dread. Try listening to it at night with the lights out.
Also:
Mussorgsky - The Old Castle, the Hut on Fowl's Legs and the Catacombs/Con Mortuis, all from Pictures at an Exhibition
Scriabin - Most of the sonatas
Brahms - Scherzo in Ebm, not so much scary but very angry sounding
Debussy - Canope from the Preludes has a very eerie sound
Rachmaninov - Prelude in C#m
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Rachmaninov - 1 Piano sonate
Liszt - Piano sonate
Beethoven - Piano sonate op. 111
Rachmaninov - Prelude op. 23/5, etude op. 39/6, etude op. 33/4 (5)
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"In the hall of the mountain king" was the first that came to mind.
I checked out a couple other suggestions. here where my top 2. scriabin's piano sonata no. 9 - and evgeny kissin's pictures at an exhibition
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The first movement of the Dies Irae for Verdi's Requiem...
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Also: Dies Irae from Mozart's Requiem.
But scary in a ''the apocalypse will come!'' way.. also, knowing the meaning of the lyrics helps a great deal.
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Came home this afternoon - the radio had been left on and was playing the scherzo (well, for want of a better term - black joke if ever I heard one) from Shostakovich's 8th Symphony. I thought of this thread.
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Beethoven's sonata pathetique, and the Ghost piano trio.
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jerusalem
"and did those feet in ancient times
walk upon england's mountains green..."
shiver shiver
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Debussy's Ce qu'a vu le vent d'ouest (What the West Wind Saw), No.7 from his Prelude Book I. This piece gets me every time. I mean, the climax starting at measure 15 is sounds like something creeping...getting closer...closer...closer...then it catches you at measures 21. Actually, many climaxes are throughout the whole work. If you've heard this, you'll definitely know what I mean.
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Brahms Ballade Op 10 No 1 ("Edward") . "After a Scottish Ballade"
https://www.pianoped.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/edward.pdf
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Liszt Totentanz :P
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Some Prokofiev Sonatas have made me do a double-take at the computer screen, but then again, I do scare easily...
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I have "demonic" marked in my score of Rachmaninoff's Prelude op 32 #6.
The ending piece in Schumann's Kreisleriana seems spooky.
Saint-Saens "Danse Macabre" self-identifies.
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The ending of Scriabin etude op 8 no 12 seemed scary enough.
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I found Le Gibet a lot scarier than Scarbo. :-\
Best regards, Dr
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Scarbo's begining was creepy though.
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creepy (not serious art music but fun to play and read through, especially if you understand the context of the work in the movie), but cute and sweet at the same time, not a common combination, this is a 'free version' no copyright infringement intended
https://www.printercraft.com/nightmare.html
piano version (audio file attached is mido sequence for reference)
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That white headed is so creepy! he's like death. The music's not bad.
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this one is very erie sounding, i just played through this (most of it) while messing around with some randomn stuff to sight read on,
Uematsu - Succession of Witches
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i almost forgot about this, doesn't sound scary, but i think it qualifies based on the words. i love eflman's stuff. i think i'll be breaking out my corpse bride and nightmare before christmas books again after giving this a listen...
Die Die, we all pass away (Remains Of The Day) , (nice bluesy piano parts)
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Ravel in G concerto
last mvt
It is rather frantic to me, not scary. ;)
Scarbo's begining was creepy though.
That is right, I agree.
My mother also finds Debussy's Etude no.7 a bit eerie. :)
Best regards, Dr
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Le gibet was a bit scary, after all. I just listened to it.
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Well, perhaps, but if you are listening it in dark, and you have read the poem to which the piece was written:
Ah! Could what I hear be the yelping of the cold night wind, or the hanged man giving forth a sigh on the gallows fork.
Could it be some cricket singing, crouched in the moss and the sterile ivy that the forest wears out of pity?
Could it be some fly on the hunt, blowing its horn around those ears deaf to the fanfare of tally-hos?
Could it be some beetle plucking, in its uneven flight a bloody hair from its bald skull?
Or could it be some spider embroidering a half yard of muslin as a tie for that strangled neck?
It is the bell tolling to the walls of a city under the horizon, and the carcass of a hanged man reddened by the setting sun.
And you are involuntarily imagining it, it is certainly a bit scarier, at least for me. :)
Best regards, Dr
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I recently discovered an Etude by Ligeti and it is called 'the devil's staircase'. The whole piece was creepy for me.
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I wrote a piece a while ago titled "Halloween Night", and made it for several instruments and ensembles.
You can download the free easy version for piano solo below:
https://www.virtualsheetmusic.com/score/HalloweenNightPfEasy.html
Comments and feedback welcome!
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Whilst it's for violin and piano rather than piano solo, try the middle movement of Alkan's Grand Duo Concertant Op. 21 with its giveaway title l'Enfer which, although dating from around 1840, sounds as though conceived in the 20th century and indeed its opening bears an uncanny resemblance to that of Busoni's Sonata No. 2 for violin and piano, albeit far more threateningly; also there's no. 45 of the same composer's 49 Esquisses Op. 63 which has the similarly giveaway title Les Diablotins which was first published about two decades after the Grand Duo but still inhabits the 20th rather than 19th century with its cluster chords (if you please!) that I've read described as "reminiscent of Ornstein, Ives or Cowell, or would be had they not predated the biths of all of those composers!"...
There's no shortage of other scary pieces by Alkan, even though some are just more scary to play than to listen to, not least a few that somehow almost feel as though they have to played too fast in order not to sound as though they're under tempo! (for example the Scherzo focoso Op. 24, the finale of the Symphonie that is no. 7 of Douze Études dans les tons mineurs Op. 39, the last of the three études Op. 76 nd indeed the finale of that Grand Duo, although there are others).
Best,
Alistair
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Hector Berlioz' Symphonie Fantastique "Witches Sabbath" is as scary as they come... :o Not a piano piece, but creepy nonetheless...
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Hector Berlioz' Symphonie Fantastique "Witches Sabbath" is as scary as they come... :o Not a piano piece, but creepy nonetheless...
It is a piano piece when Liszt gets his unique hands on it! (listen to French pianist Roger Muraro's recording of it at ).
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It is a piano piece when Liszt gets his unique hands on it! (listen to French pianist Roger Muraro's recording of it at ).
This is simply awesome!!!
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:o
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Messiaen: Apparition de l'eglise eternelle :o
Stravinsky: The rite of spring
Debussy: Footprints in the Snow / Des pas sur la neige
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None of it that I've heard so is exactly "over your shoulder" scary - altho the sheer psychotic mania of the opening scherzo movement of his Grand Sonata comes close - but it's all so sinister, so unnerving, so downright strange - both overtly and covertly - that it all leaves you feeling as if you've just traversed an insane asylum.
The fact that it's all contained within the musical language of mid-19th century Romanticism makes it even more subversive and disturbing. Depending on how musically sensitive you are [in the case of music, sensitivity is good - it's talent - or a portion of talent], you'll find yourself shifted subliminally to the extent that other music you face after hearing Alkan may also seem to diabolically touched by it.
I avoid Alkan.
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Ok, this is extremely scary:
Bartok Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta :o :o
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:o
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'communist'?
'antichrist'??
Really?