"depressing" pieces

[aewanko]

suggestions anyone?

[wm_1]

Mass in B-minor?

[somnifer]

Chopin: Prelude in C Sharp Minor, Op. 45

Tschaikowsky: October from The Seasons

Chopin: Etude Op. 25 No. 7

[argerichfan]

A fair chunk of Liszt's Années de pèlerinage (Third Year). 

[redbaron]

J.S. Bach - Toccata in Dm
Rachmaninov - Prelude in C#m
Chopin - Funeral March
Mussorgsky - The Old Castle and Bydlo from Pictures at an Exhibition
Scriabin - Etude in C#m Op 2 No 1
Scriabin - Black Mass Sonata

i suppose you could argue that the Moonlight Sonata is depressing.

[soderlund]

Chopin prelude in A minor, op. 28 no. 2 is possibly the most depressing piece ever, for me... I find Liszt Funérallies pretty depressing too, but not like that Chopin prelude.Oh yeah, Chopin 10.6 too

[nanabush]

--Pavane Pour une Infante Defunte (Pavane for a Dead Princess) by Ravel
  disturbingly beautiful, but at the same time very sad.  And in a major key!  Check it out.

--I half agree with the Funerailles.  I wish I could keep looping the piece from the first octave section, when it suddenly picks up.  Gives me shivers no matter how much I hear it.

--Rachmaninoff Etude Op. 39 #7 in C minor.  Seemingly strange at first, has a short choral-ish part near the beginning, then picks up.  The piece builds up to a climax, which reminds me a bit of church bells.  Very depressing, and creepy piece.

[healdie]

there are various pieces by Schumann that would come under this title, I often play them at college and the ussuall responce is "for gods sake healdie play somehing happy"

They are plentyof these by him so pick one

also Waltz in D minor by Brahms,

[cherub_rocker1979]

Scriabin - Etude in D sharp minor, Fantasie in B minor
Medtner - Sonata Reminiscenza, Sonata Romantica
Prokofiev - 2nd movement from 4th Sonata
Chopin - Polonaise in F sharp minor

I've noticed that a lot of people here and at Piano World are starting threads for darkest and most depressing pieces, lol.

[argerichfan]

I've noticed that a lot of people here and at Piano World are starting threads for darkest and most depressing pieces, lol.

Must be "that" time of year... fall equinox, shorter days, then Halloween...   

[dnephi]

I think of the Strauss orchestral tone poems, but I don't know of any decent piano transcriptions.

[aewanko]

I've noticed that a lot of people here and at Piano World are starting threads for darkest and most depressing pieces, lol.

I just need some "counter-agent" for my emotionless self. I can't seem to draw sadness from recordings now.

[argerichfan]

I think of the Strauss orchestral tone poems, but I don't know of any decent piano transcriptions.

Strauss tone poems depressing?  You've lost me here, unless you feel that their hedonistic qualities and cynical attitude cause depression.  Strauss was a magnificently talented composer with a supreme technique second to none, he knew what he excelled at, and he provided his audience with just what would fire them up.  How well he succeeded.  Heldenleben is one of my favourite works.

Strauss (Busoni referred to him as "an industrialist even in music") always kept the "stiff upper lip", and perhaps he only truly revealed himself in his late, gloriously valedictory, works.  Otherwise, his great contemporaries, Mahler and Elgar, were much better at expressing a sense of depression.

Piano transcriptions of the tone poems exist (Otto Singer did most, if not all the major ones), but they are primarily for study purposes, not performance.  Interestingly, Strauss arranges decently for piano (probably because of so much doubling in his orchestration), but it resists a virtuoso treatment.  In this he is different from Mahler and Elgar who don't arrange conveniently for piano at all.  (Elgar's publishers were quite frustrated by this... they certainly wanted to cash in on Elgar's popularity.  Even a simple piece such as Carissima is awkward on the piano.)

[dnephi]

I'm thinking more along the lines of Elektra and Tod und Verklerang (sp?), although the Elektra is obviously an opera.  Besides Crumb's epic Black Angels and Berg's Wozzeck, Elektra is quite possibly the most disturbing music I've ever heard.

[iheartpiano]

I always thought Chopin Nocturne in C sharp minor (op. 27, no. 1) was pretty sad.

[leuthold]

chopin prelude op.28 no.20 c minor.

[frank_48]

Chopin Etude, Op 10/3
Chopin Waltz, Op 34/2
Chopin Nocturne, Op 72/1

[communist]

Rachmaninoff prelude op.32 no.10

Rachmaninoff moment musical no.3

Rachmaninoff Corelli variations

Liszt Hungarian rhapsody no.5

[momopi]

Satie - Gymnopedie

[tanman]

Ravel scarbo and le gibet and pavane for a dead princess
Scriabin etude op. 2 no. 1, op. 8 no. 11, op. 8 no. 12, op. 42 no. 5, black mass sonata
Chopin funeral march, certain parts of ballades no. 1 and 4
Debussy prelude book 1 no. 6
 




















and of course fur elise

[akonow]

Chopin's Nocturne Op. 48 No. 1
Dobrzynski's Nocturnes
Liszt's Valse-Impromptu
Many of Mendelssohn's Lieder Ohne Worte
Mozart's Requiem (especially Lacrimosa)
Lots of Satie - the gnossiennes for example
Scriabin
Villa-Lobos

[ptyrrell]

mahler song of the earth

[rachmaninova]

Mahler's "Kindertotenlieder"
Schumann's "Dichterliebe"

(but still two of the most greatest works of art...)

[kard]

Prokofiev- Fugitive visions #1
Bartok - Buciumeana (one of the folk songs..i forget which)

[sauergrandson]

Dutilleux, Messiaen.....

The last string quartets, Beethoven

[retrouvailles]

Dutilleux, Messiaen.....

Are you saying that everything by these two is depressing? I would largely beg to differ.

[cloches_de_geneve]

Schubert, A-major Sonata (D959): Second movement. Insanely desperate.

[mikey6]

Does it have to be piano?
Last movt Tchaik 6
Schubert Der Doppelganger
Wagner prelude and Liebestod

[birba]

Mass in B-minor?

Maybe for you, but it turns ME on!

[birba]

Piano transcriptions of the tone poems exist (Otto Singer did most, if not all the major ones), but they are primarily for study purposes, not performance.  Interestingly, Strauss arranges decently for piano (probably because of so much doubling in his orchestration), but it resists a virtuoso treatment.  In this he is different from Mahler and Elgar who don't arrange conveniently for piano at all.  (Elgar's publishers were quite frustrated by this... they certainly wanted to cash in on Elgar's popularity.  Even a simple piece such as Carissima is awkward on the piano.)

I just bought the sorabji transcription of the last scene from Salome.  Wow.  Don't know if I'll ever be able to play it, but I'm going to try.  Now THAT is anything but depressing.

[birba]

I'm thinking more along the lines of Elektra and Tod und Verklerang (sp?), although the Elektra is obviously an opera.  Besides Crumb's epic Black Angels and Berg's Wozzeck, Elektra is quite possibly the most disturbing music I've ever heard.

Elektra, for me, is perhaps some of the greatest music ever written.  I'm trying to figure out what people mean by "depressing" music.

[mikey6]

Piano transcriptions of the tone poems exist (Otto Singer did most, if not all the major ones),  

I think Libetta;s transcription of till eulenspiegel is woeful!  Just does not work on piano!
I heard the prelude from Tristan arr. by Kocsis played before Liszt's Liebestodd, I'm not a huge fan of that arr anyway but it worked a lot betetr than the prelude - it's just not piano music!

[birba]

I'm going to be very bold here and say I don't find ANY music depressing.  Maybe nostalgic.  Or sad.  Or haunting.  Like Strauss' four last songs.  They're very intense and sometimes gloomy, but not at all depressing.  Someone clue me in here.  I don't know if I got the gist of it all.

[G.W.K]

Maybe for you, but it turns ME on!

You're that...um...passionate are you? 

G.W.K

[birba]

Well...maybe I overstated it a bit.  But it certainly doesn't depress me.

[G.W.K]

Well...maybe I overstated it a bit.

Indeed! LOL

G.W.K

[guendola]

Marche Funebre, Op. 26 by Charles Valentin Alkan is pretty depressive too and a great piece of music anyway.

[chopinmozart7]

Hawas ballade No 1