Halloween

[ronde_des_sylphes]

This started out as an improvisation, but as I've now written it out (no small task!) and made some small cosmetic alterations, I guess it becomes a composition..

Anyway, this uses the original audio with a few microscopic edits in order to get better musical grammar at points where it was nagging at me.

Cheery synopsis 🦇🎃:

Halloween is a dark, gothic fantasy, set entirely within minor keys and largely constructed around two motives - a slow triplet processional and the Dies Irae.

A slow, contemplative opening sets a scene of foreboding: the Dies Irae is alluded to in the second line before the opening introduction leads into a melancholic lamentation. As the lamentation swells, growing more impassioned, and the mood turns more agitato as bats fly overhead. A trudging funeral procession enters, set in slow, remorseless triplets, interspersed with the bats and an increasing sense of ill-omen. The procession continues, swelling and receding into a sense of deepest sadness, until interrupted by a demon and his acolytes appearing suddenly from the gloom.

The procession becomes more animated in character as evil spirits rise up. Rain beats down as a storm breaks with a thunderclap; the wind swirls in increasing fury and a brief cadenza-like passage leads into dark, evil swamps (note the Dies Irae in tritone harmony). The Devil is beckoned forth and the wind howls around long-forgotten graves.

The Devil himself finally appears amidst a mass of tritones and diminished harmonies as Armageddon arrives. In the eerie aftermath of this shattering event the Dies Irae, stated slowly and heavily in the very bass of the keyboard, signifies the arrival of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. In the still of the post-Apocalyptic carnage only a few birds remain to contemplate the remnants as the Devil begins his final task of dragging souls to Hell. The Grim Reaper remains, conqueror of all.

🙂