# Most Chilling Portamentos?



## sonnenuntergangstunde (Apr 20, 2013)

Having been studying Howard Shore's music for The Lord of the Rings, there are a few instances of absolutely spine-chilling portamentos used in the high strings. One example is here: (begins at 18s) - 



 . The portamento over the descending 3rd's pattern in the bass makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up 

Does anyone know of any other good examples in film music or classical music?


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## DrKilroy (Sep 29, 2012)

There is a nice portamento-wide vibrato effect in the second part of Adams' Harmonielehre:






Go to about 9:20.

Best regards, Dr


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

The great larghissimo second movement of William Schuman's 10th Symphony makes great use of portamento.


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## stevederekson (Jan 5, 2014)

hpowders said:


> The great larghissimo second movement of William Schuman's 10th Symphony makes great use of portamento.


Is this piece atonal? Listening to it I cannot really tell, it is full of dissonance but seems rather tonally structured.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

stevederekson said:


> Is this piece atonal? Listening to it I cannot really tell, it is full of dissonance but seems rather tonally structured.


Dissonance and tonality are not mutually exclusive. Of course, I also don't believe that atonality is a coherent concept.

As for the thread topic...what about the glissando harmonics from the opening of The Firebird?

At 1:58 here:


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

stevederekson said:


> Is this piece atonal? Listening to it I cannot really tell, it is full of dissonance but seems rather tonally structured.


It is like you described: tonal with dissonance. Love the portamenti in the second movement. Creates a disturbing, eerie effect.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Bartok has some chilling portamenti in his Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta.
Music not to listen to alone. Hide the kids!


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## Jobis (Jun 13, 2013)

sonnenuntergangstunde said:


> Having been studying Howard Shore's music for The Lord of the Rings, there are a few instances of absolutely spine-chilling portamentos used in the high strings. One example is here: (begins at 18s) -
> 
> 
> 
> ...


The hobbit soundtracks have been so disappointing compared to how great the lord of the rings ones were. I don't believe its because Howard Shore has taken a step back and is no longer orchestrating because the orchestration is still top notch, but the themes are just lacking.


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

Jobis said:


> but the themes are just lacking.


On the contrary - every now and then, you can hear theme from LoTR popping up in disguise. The soundtrack in Hobbit is much like second-water after one from previous trilogy. I am disappointed as well.


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

I liked the laconic comment posted below the YouTube clip:



> 9 ringwraiths like this


 :lol:


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

The third movement of Prokofiev's 3rd symphony is the first thing that came to my mind.






Starting around 24 seconds


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## Tristan (Jan 5, 2013)

So...I don't mean to play dumb here, but I thought of an example, but now I'm not sure if it's a glissando or a portamento. What exactly is the difference between the two?


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Tristan said:


> So...I don't mean to play dumb here, but I thought of an example, but now I'm not sure if it's a glissando or a portamento. What exactly is the difference between the two?


A glissando is more likely to emphasize each note on the way down or up. A portamento is just a slide without an identifiable scale heard within it.

They've been used somewhat interchangeable in the 20th century though.


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## BurningDesire (Jul 15, 2012)

Some nice portamento-glissandi in this piece


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

hpowders said:


> Bartok has some chilling portamenti in his Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta.
> Music not to listen to alone. Hide the kids!


It was used to absolutely blood curdling effect in that 1970s horror movie "The Shining." I think the music is more scary than the movie, mind you. If I'm going to be pedaling my tricycle through the empty corridors of a creepy hotel, and I had to choose between encountering the ghosts of dead girls on the one hand, and Bartok on the other, I may well pick the dead girls.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

brianvds said:


> It was used to absolutely blood curdling effect in that 1970s horror movie "The Shining." I think the music is more scary than the movie, mind you. If I'm going to be pedaling my tricycle through the empty corridors of a creepy hotel, and I had to choose between encountering the ghosts of dead girls on the one hand, and Bartok on the other, I may well pick the dead girls.


I've seen that several times. There should be a warning on Bartok CD jewel boxes: "Must be played with the lights on."


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## Tristan (Jan 5, 2013)

The one I was thinking of was the subtle one at the end of the first movement of Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5. I always noticed it and found it chilling.

In this video, it occurs at 15:23:






In some versions, it's so soft that you can barely notice it; in this particular recording, it's a little more prominent.


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## SuperTonic (Jun 3, 2010)

There are several in the Adagietto movement of Mahler's 5th Symphony, but the one at around 6:40 in this youtube video rarely fails to give me chills.


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

hpowders said:


> I've seen that several times. There should be a warning on Bartok CD jewel boxes: "Must be played with the lights on."


Just gave it a quick listen. Yikes! It is indeed spine chilling, but I have to say, also utterly beautiful in all its bleak darkness. Bartok is one of my fav 20th century composers.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

brianvds said:


> Just gave it a quick listen. Yikes! It is indeed spine chilling, but I have to say, also utterly beautiful in all its bleak darkness. Bartok is one of my fav 20th century composers.


He had a terrific imagination. This was composing "outside the box"!


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## kangxi (Jan 24, 2014)

Portamento was used extensively by string players at the turn of the nineteenth century. Fritz Kreisler was a master of it. Try the Bach Double with him and Efrem Zimbalist Snr, recorded with an unknown string quartet "inside," as one critic said, "a matchbox." There's also a lot of portamento (if my memory serves) in the famous recording of the Mozart sinfonia concertante by Albert Sammons & Lionel Tertis. I find it lovely but it's gone out of fashion now.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

In the great Beethoven Symphony cycle of 1939, Arturo Toscanini used it frequently throughout the symphonies as an expressive means; always tasteful, never heart on sleeve. Puts the lie to rest that portamenti shouldn't be used anymore in Beethoven; that it's "anachronistic".

Nothing "chilling" about it. Just an illustration of how a great conductor can use the effect and not sound out-dated and old fashioned.


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## CBD (Nov 11, 2013)

There is portamenti in the second and third movements of Prokofiev's symphony no. 3 that I think are very effective.


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## kangxi (Jan 24, 2014)

Hey! I forgot Haydn! In Symphony no60 'Il Distratto' he has the violins (or maybe the entire string section) retune one of the strings a tone lower than normal for most of the symphony. The when he launches the finale at a sprightly allegro he 'forgets' what he instructed and the result after a bar or so is wrong; so he askes the strings to retune the 'wrongly' tuned string (this is all written in the score). The resulting portamento en masse is momentarily hideous, then they set off at a gallop all in tune again. That grating portamento as the strings re-tune is the opposite of 'chilling' as the OP requested, but it's funny. And the symphony is delicious.
Also, from more or less the same period, does Mozart's Musical Joke involve some mistuning and sliding? 
Oh, and Siegfried, trying out his horn, slides all over the place. Again, not what the OP asked for, but wotthehell said Mehitabel.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

kangxi said:


> Hey! I forgot Haydn! In Symphony no60 'Il Distratto' he has the violins (or maybe the entire string section) retune one of the strings a tone lower than normal for most of the symphony. The when he launches the finale at a sprightly allegro he 'forgets' what he instructed and the result after a bar or so is wrong; so he askes the strings to retune the 'wrongly' tuned string (this is all written in the score). The resulting portamento en masse is momentarily hideous, then they set off at a gallop all in tune again. That grating portamento as the strings re-tune is the opposite of 'chilling' as the OP requested, but it's funny. And the symphony is delicious.


This reminded me of the moment when the bar band in Wozzeck is busy retuning their instruments (itself a chilling moment because the fool confronts Wozzeck saying that "Happy, so happy, but it reeks, it reeks of blood!" Then the band starts up again and Wozzeck's madness becomes one with the delirium of the revelries.

And then I thought of the truly chilling motif associated with the knife, culminating in the murder scene in Act 3 Scene 2. Plenty of portamento there.


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

A little Wozzek goes a long way with me; or Lulu.


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## prevost (Jan 28, 2014)

An excellent example of a glissando is the clarinet solo opening of _Rhapsody In Blue_.


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

Marschallin Blair said:


> A little Wozzek goes a long way with me; or Lulu.


HA HA, Me too. A looooong way.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

Personally, of all the post-Mahler composers, I consider Berg the most Mahler-like in a number of ways.


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