I like happy endings. If you’ve read any of my fiction, you know that I write them. Bummers are popular in literary fiction, and were when I got my liberal arts education fifty years ago. (This is why I don’t write literary fiction. That shoe just don’t fit.) But this applies to music as well as fiction. The three characteristics I look for in music are these: Melody, Harmony, and Energy. I’ve enjoyed an occasional sad song (like “The Parting Glass”) for various reasons, but if a sad song has none of those three characteristics, I won’t buy it—and if there’s a skip button, my index finger finds it at some significant fraction of c.
Energy is the one I get the most pushback about. Who doesn’t like a peaceful tinkling Mozart piano piece? Well, if I can’t hum it…me. I have always used music to rev me up and break me out of blocks in my thinking or especially my writing. Energy in music is a very big thing for me.
So in today’s entry I present a playlist of some classical pieces that carry a special grip on my imagination: the music of triumph. No gentle fade at the end. Uh-uh. I want a musical explosion that makes me want to stand up and cheer. Yes, I’m that kind of screwball. If you didn’t know that already, well, this playlist will make it abundantly clear.
All links are to performances on YouTube. There are many others available.
- Also Sprach Zarathustra (Thus Spoke Zoroaster), by Richard Strauss, 1896. This one has special significance for me, because it’s the unforgettable opening piece in 2001: A Space Odyssey, which may be my favorite film of all time—and the film I asked Carol out to see for our first date in 1969.
- Symphony #3, Organ, final movement, Maestoso, by Camille Saint-Saens, 1886. It was years after I saw the 1995 film Babe that I first heard this larger work from which the Babe theme borrowed. The thunderous organ sequences are like nothing else I’ve heard in classical music. It opens with an explosion, and ends with an even bigger explosion. What’s not to love?
- Building the Crate, by John Powell, from the Chicken Run soundtrack, 2000. I’ve mentioned this one before, and whereas it strikes some people as slightly goofy in spots, it’s definitely stirring. There’s a touch of klezmer in it, and for a few seconds a chorus (if that’s the word) of…kazoos. It’s all about the chickens triumphing, something one doesn’t generally associate with chickens. But triumph they do, with callbacks to films The Great Escape and The Flight of the Phoenix.
- Lincolnshire Posy 6: Lost Lady Found, by Percy Grainger, 1937. Short and to the point, and definitely gets across the triumph of finding a beloved person after a long and difficult search.
- The Planets: Jupiter, by Gustav Holst, 1917. If you’ve heard anything in this playlist, you’ve heard ol’ Jupe. Although subtitled ‘The Bringer of Jollity” (is that still a word?) its utterly explosive ending makes me consider it “The Bringer of Triumph.”
- Russian Sailors’ Dance, by Reinhold Gliere, 1927. Written as part of a ballet called The Red Poppy, it starts out low and slow, gathering speed and force as it goes, until it reaches a manic but completely satisfying explosion at the end.
- Towards a New Life, by Josef Suk, 1931. I never heard this until KBAQ played it a couple of years ago. It deserves way more than obscurity. A triumphant march for full orchestra, it has roots in Czech nationalism and lyrics in the Czech language for which there is no English translation. (The linked performance is instrumental only.) Some think the trumpet solo opening is too long; if you agree, skip the first 90 seconds.
- Symphony #9. The New World: Finale, by Antonin Dvorak, 1895. There are a few slow parts in this finale to Dvorak’s all-time best work, but they act to frame the explosive energy of the rest and make it stand out by contrast. That’s ok; sometimes we have pause for a bit to take a breath, in our lungs and sometimes in our lives. No matter; the explosion at the end makes the quiet parts worthwhile.
- Pictures at an Exhibition: The Great Gate of Kiev, finale, by Modest Mussorgsky, 1874. In spite of the countless times I’ve heard it, this piece continues to bring a tear to my eye, often as not. Especially when preceded by the creepy and subversively diabolical movement “Baba Yaga’s Hut,” (as here) to me it symbolizes humanity staring down Evil, kicking its ass across the galaxy twice, and then dropping it down the black hole at the galaxy’s core, where it belongs and will trouble us no more. Triumph you want? Triumph I’ll give you!
That’s all for now. Got any more? I’m always in the market for music like this.
Ottorino Respighi: “The Pines of Rome”
Antonin Dvorak: Carnival
Nicholai Rimsky Korsakov: Procession of the Nobles (from ‘Mlada’)
Mikhail Glinka: Overture to ‘Ruslin and Lyudmilla’ (General rejoicing.)
Hector Berlioz: Roman Carnival
Hector Berlioz: Symphonie Fantastique
Alberto Ginastera: Malambo (from “La Estancia’) esp. this one https://youtu.be/y36xmzYpujc?si=6AyoceKi9HxIiBRx
John Adams: Short Ride in a Fast Machine
I could ramble on.
I came close on “Procession of the Nobles.” The melodies, like all of R-K’s, are wonderful. My problem is that it’s just a little too, well, stately. Which I guess is what you want for nobles processing.
I forgot a few, sure. I greatly enjoy Grieg’s “March of the Trolls,” except that it’s not a march–it’s a mad scramble. It’s a little like Rossini’s “March of the Swiss Soldiers.” That’s not a march. It’s a gallop and then some–and most of us can’t pry it loose from The Lone Ranger. I may include both of those if I do a second playlist, as they have all the energy I require.
You’re dead right about this: Leaving out the final movement of Symphonie Fantastique was a serious mistake. It’s got everything. Why I didn’t think of it, I don’t know. 70s moment, I guess. Ruslan & Ludmila has very nice melodies, but it’s a little too…controlled. It fits far better in the Classical tradition than the Romantic tradition. I’d say it needs a little more explosion, but in a near-mathematical piece like that, explosion would be out of place. I’ll have to listen to “The Pines of Rome again.” Haven’t heard it in a while. And I never heard of Malambo, but I’ll look it up. Ditto “Short Ride in a Fast Machine.” Haven’t heard it for years and years and don’t genuinely remember how it goes. Manic, yeah. We’ll see how much melody it has.
Many thanks for the suggestions. I’m already thinking of starting a new list. You’ve given me a helluva good start.
The French impressionist composers.
https://www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php?topic=67740.0
Ironically your playlist begins with a work that does fade a bit at the end. A complete performance of Zarathustra takes 30 or 40 minutes and nothing comes even close to the first 4 or 5 that everybody knowns from the movie. Still, many think those 4 or 5 are worth the price of admission …
Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony is another work where everybody knows the opening. But in this case the finally (the fourth movement) does fit all your criteria. Like the Mussorgsky, it gains from contrast to what went just before.
The Saint-Saens symphony is best appreciated in person when you feel the organ was as well as hear it. Of course, that requires that your concert hall have a monster organ. Some do; many don’t.
I love O Fortuna. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXFSK0ogeg4
“What’s Opera Doc?” [Kill the Wabbit], from Bugs Bunny on Broadway, Warner Brothers Symphony Orchestra. Bugs addresses happy endings in a final solilquy.
Bugs, and “this is the ceral shot from guns”, was my intro to classical. I haven’t progressed much beyond that, but New World Symphony is my favorite.
Handel, Music for the Royal Fireworks, second movement: Bourrée.
If this piece does not invoke an 18th-century military victory, then George Frideric Handel was no musician.
OK, probably not what your looking for but:
March Slav https://youtu.be/gb2h24lTqho?feature=shared – I prefer this to the 1812 Overture, slightly, which you are also missing, but 1812 spends more time in the dumps at the start before the cannons get firing.
Listz — Hungarian Rhapsody #2 https://youtu.be/uNi-_0kqpdE?feature=shared — For me a favorite pick me up and trot song.
Brahms — Hungarian Dances #5 & 6 https://youtu.be/O192eo9zbT4?feature=shared
Saint-Saëns – Danse Macabre – https://youtu.be/qNMzBnuBC6Y?feature=shared — Yes, maybe not quite as strident as the others, but it is very upbeat, and you know they are having fun… Plus, Saint Saens, what can I say but I’ve never heard a piece of his I didn’t like.
Aaron Copeland, Fanfare For The Common Man: https://youtu.be/ZdqjcMmjeaA?feature=shared
John Williams – Liberty Fanfare — https://youtu.be/0LoK25JZ0dA?feature=shared I personally believe that John Williams is the greatest composer of the 20th century, and might also be the greatest of the 21st (we have a lot of time before someone can judge the latter).
Sousa — Stars and Stripes forever: https://youtu.be/TvWWXv59apY?feature=shared I know, military marches, but such energy! Sousa was the king of focused rhythm and energy.
John Williams – Olympics Theme: https://youtu.be/CyTJzKvB9sA?feature=shared
Greg, Hall of the Mountain King: https://youtu.be/4nMUr8Rt2AI?feature=shared
Thanks so much Jeff for triggering a run through some of my favorites.
Oh, one other oddball one:
J.S. Bach Toccata and Fugue in D Minor: https://youtu.be/erXG9vnN-GI?feature=shared
It is mostly used for villain introductions in B shows, but the piece starts strong, and moves lively to a majestic close. There are many recordings, but it is best to listen either live, or on a stereo that can accurately handle full spectrum sound for an extended period of time.