Behind The Scenes at our March Concert

by Maestro Lawrence Eckerling

As a musician, one of the delights in learning music is hearing and identifying when a composer borrows from another composer or source, or borrows from him or herself. (A specific example is listening to the music of John Williams’ score to Star Wars, where he borrows music or style from ­seemingly every composer that I have ever studied!) We know that Bach borrowed music from himself, as did ­Handel, as did Mozart. The list goes on.

But there seems to be a universal fascination in musical history with one particular tune: the one known as the Dies Irae (Day of Wrath). Almost all Requiem Masses (including Verdi’s great Requiem that we are performing this June) have a Dies Irae, and sometimes they are quite famous. But here I’m talking about the original Dies Irae, which is a ­Gregorian chant. View opening stanza below.

Hector Berlioz used this theme in his Symphonie ­Fantastique — in the last movement, “Dream of a Witches Sabbath.” It’s pretty terrifying music. Franz Liszt attended the premiere, gave it rave reviews, and declared it a “work of genius.”

Clearly, this theme had a deep impact on Liszt, as his ­Totentanz for Piano and Orchestra, which we are playing in this upcoming March concert with guest soloist Gleb Ivanov, is a set of variations on the Dies Irae theme.

But those aren’t the only composers who have used this theme! Rachmaninoff used it in at least seven of his ­orchestral works, most notably The Isle of the Dead and the Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. Gustav Holst used it in The Planets, Tchaikovsky in his Suite No. 3 and Mahler used it in two different movements of his ­“Resurrection” Symphony. And even Stephen Sondheim used it in Sweeney Todd!

I don’t have an answer for why this theme seems to be the “code word (code tune)” of choice amongst composers any time something scary or serious is to be portrayed. But the tradition continues to be carried on by contemporary ­composers such as George Crumb (Black Angels), Michael Daugherty (Dead Elvis) and film composer Danny Elfman (The Nightmare Before Christmas).

Even if the musical example below doesn’t help you to hear the Dies Irae in your head, rest assured that you’ll know it by heart by the end of the Totentanz! (And you’ll get to hear the Dies Irae again in next season’s mystery ­Rachmaninoff work, which will be announced later
this ­season).