# Most melancholy/sad/depressed piano(or not) pieces?



## mastermustard (Apr 4, 2015)

I'm looking for music that conjures images of mourners in black, surrounding flower-laden graves, in heavy rain. Something dark and somber. The actual instrument(s) involved aren't important, as long as they convey that feeling.

Any ideas?


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

For a good wallow you might want to try Shostakovich's String Quartet no. 15 - it certainly has valedictory qualities (and that's not the only one of his that has).


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Many of Brahms late solo piano pieces are introspective works of a composer who knows death is just around the corner.

The second movement (Funeral March) of Beethoven's Eroica Symphony conjures up what you are looking for too.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

As with many of Ravel's pieces, there's an orchestrated version too.











Another famous piece.


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## Cosmos (Jun 28, 2013)

Is it cheesy to say Gorecki's Symphony 3? That one always makes me feel blue
Bach's Chaconne is a great one. It's originally for solo violin [from his Partita no. 2], but there have been tons of arrangements for other instruments. I.e. Busoni's piano transcription is popular
Mahler's Kindertotenlieder 
Various songs from Schubert's Winterreise. The first one, "Gute nacht" comes to mind
Arvo Part's Tabula Rasa is good one, though the second movement "Silentium" may be closer to what you're looking for
Or you could go with the nearly cliched answer: Beethoven's Sonata no. 14 mov. 1 ["Moonlight" Sonata]


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

mastermustard said:


> I'm looking for music that conjures images of mourners in black, surrounding flower-laden graves, in heavy rain. Something dark and somber. The actual instrument(s) involved aren't important, as long as they convey that feeling.
> 
> Any ideas?


The march from Frederick Chopin's second piano sonata. Or if you want a whole orchestra, the instrumental piece called "Siegfried's Funeral March" from an opera called Gotterdammerung by Richard Wagner.

If you're interested in creating an antiquated ambiance, then there's something normally played on a harpsichord called "Le Tombeau de Blancrocher" by Louis Couperin.

For voices, there's a motet called "Absalon fili mi" by Josquin des Prez.

The most dark and somber of the lot are the threnodies, I think there are three of them, at the end of Franz Liszt's Années. They're too sombre for me, but they may be just the job for you. Try the first piece here, Liszt's Sunt Rerum Lacrimae, on this live recording by Erwin Nyiregyházi


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## Andreas (Apr 27, 2012)




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## mastermustard (Apr 4, 2015)

Thanks for the help!


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## MoonlightSonata (Mar 29, 2014)

The famous "Dido's Lament" from Dido and Aeneas by Purcell is very sad, as is the March from his Funeral Music for Queen Mary.

Somehow it seems nobody's mentioned Barber's Adagio for Strings, one of the most famously mournful pieces ever written.

Allegri's _Miserere Mei, Deus_ is very penitent; particularly poignant in my opinion is a little phrase just before the first high C which sounds all the world like crying.

The first and third movements of Elgar's incredible Cello Concerto are hauntingly dark.

Ravel's _Pavane for a Dead Infanta_ has a lovely melody and is very elegiac

Sibelius' tone poem _The Swan of Tuonela_ is a good listen.


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## Saintbert (Mar 12, 2015)

The second movement of Shostakovich's second piano concerto, op. 102 is all of those things.

Here's a solo piano arrangement:


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## ColColt (Apr 3, 2015)

Several come to mind. Cavatina, as in the movie, "The Deer Hunter", Opening of "Once Upon a Time in the West", and Mahler's No.2 Symphony(Resurrection) the Finale at 1:11 on.






Cavatina...






From the movie, "Once Upon a Time in the West....(Ennio morricone - C'era Una Volta il West)






or a live performance of the above...


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## Guest (Apr 5, 2015)




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## HIDEKI SUKENOBU (Mar 31, 2015)

hpowders said:


> Many of Brahms late solo piano pieces are introspective works of a composer who knows death is just around the corner.
> 
> The second movement (Funeral March) of Beethoven's Eroica Symphony conjures up what you are looking for too.


Again I agree to him/her. The most melanchoric and depressing pieces I think are Brahms' late piano pieces named _intermezzos_ or something like that. And I can't forget the autumnal atmosphere cladding his _Crarinet Quintet_. Someone proposed *Arvo Part's Tabula Rasa*, which I know Giddon Kremer liked to play. There's nothing more to say.


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## HaydnBearstheClock (Jul 6, 2013)

mastermustard said:


> I'm looking for music that conjures images of mourners in black, surrounding flower-laden graves, in heavy rain. Something dark and somber. The actual instrument(s) involved aren't important, as long as they convey that feeling.
> 
> Any ideas?


Haydn's Seven Last Words:


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

Saintbert said:


> Here's a solo piano arrangement


Cool--I've never heard a solo piano version. Shosty's wonderfully spooky 2nd piano sonata could be mentioned here as well:


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## gHeadphone (Mar 30, 2015)

ColColt said:


> Several come to mind. Cavatina, as in the movie, "The Deer Hunter", Opening of "Once Upon a Time in the West", and Mahler's No.2 Symphony(Resurrection) the Finale at 1:11 on.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I was lucky enough to sing in the chorus conducted by Morricone a couple of times, its a great piece of music. I wasnt sure whether it was considered 'proper classical music' but its what got me into listening to classical and for that alone im forever grateful to the Italian gent.

Great choice


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

For melancholy piano pieces I usually turn to the late solo piano pieces by Brahms.


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## Blake (Nov 6, 2013)

Chopin's Nocturnes


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## Ken Cohen (Apr 10, 2015)

Schubert piano sonata D960: introspective, swinging back and forth between sadness and sunlight. To paraphrase one Gramophone review, inward, fragile, remote. Richter's performance is mesmerizing. I've often played the first movement, which I find sublime. One of my very favourite piano sonatas for many years.


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## nbharakey (Oct 5, 2010)

hpowders said:


> Many of Brahms late solo piano pieces are introspective works of a composer who knows death is just around the corner.


I had this one in mind too.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

The slow movement of CPE Bach's Symphony in C major, Wq 182 #3 is a vale of misery, due largely to the fact that it is based on the name Bach, that is, the notes Bb-A-C-B, which Bach harmonizes in an interesting way. 

The Largo e mesto from Beethoven's Sonata Op. 10 #3 is the darkest movement I know from the classical era.

Rachmaninoff's Prelude in B minor from the Opus 32 set is the embodiment of despair. Not to mention The Isle of the Dead and the last movement of his choral symphony, The Bells.

The first movement of Shostakovich's Tenth Symphony is, I believe, a tombstone for 24 million dead souls. Doesn't get much darker, although, there is the first movement of the 13th to consider. 

The first movement of Prokofiev's Violin Sonata no. 1 in F minor is harrowing.


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## csacks (Dec 5, 2013)

Some parts of Britten´s War Requiem. Dies Irae. The names speaks for his own!
The second movement of Brahms´First sextet is heartrending.
Some Shostakovich´s symphonies. Leningrad (7th) has some piercing passages.


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## MJongo (Aug 6, 2011)




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## Fugue Meister (Jul 5, 2014)

Can't leave out this one....






... this one too...






oh yeah...


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## Albert7 (Nov 16, 2014)

This Liszt piece is pretty somber to me.


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