 | Saint-Saens, Camille - "Danse Macabre" for Harp & Strings Opus 40 Harp and Strings |
Vidéo :
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| Composer : | Saint-Saens, Camille (1835 - 1921) | ||||
| Instrumentation : | Harp and Strings | ||||
| Style : | Romantic | ||||
| Arranger : | MAGATAGAN, MICHAEL (1960 - ) | ||||
| Publisher : | MAGATAGAN, MICHAEL | ||||
| Date : | 1874 | ||||
| Copyright : | Public Domain | ||||
| Added by magataganm, 13 Sep 2015 The "Danse Macabre" (Opus 40) was written as a tone poem for orchestra in 1874 by French composer Camille Saint-Saëns. It started out in 1872 as an art song for voice and piano with a French text by the poet Henri Cazalis, which is based in an old French superstition. In 1874, the composer expanded and reworked the piece into a tone poem, replacing the vocal line with a solo violin. Normally heard as a symphonic performance, this piece is unusual as an arrangement for Harp and Strings however, I created this arrangement to emphasize macab elements and uniquely dynamic range of the Concert (Pedal) Harp. I took liberal license in my interpretation of the original score, and as such, this arrangement is uniquely my "vision" of how this piece sounds to me. According to the ancient superstition, "Death" appears at midnight every year on Halloween. Death has the power to call forth the dead from their graves to dance for him while he plays his fiddle (represented by strings on the Swell with its "E-string" tuned to an "E-flat" in an example of scordatura tuning). His skeletons dance for him until the first break of dawn, when they must return to their graves until the next year. The interpretation in Measure 25+ is of a solo violin playing the tritone (or "Devil's interval") consisting of an A and an E-flat—in an example of scordatura tuning, the violinist's E string has actually been tuned down to an E-flat to create the dissonant tritone. Starting at Measure 173, is a melodic quote of the "Dies irae", a Gregorian chant from the Requiem Mass that is melodically related to the work's second theme. The Dies irae is presented in a major key, which is unusual. The abrupt break in the texture at measure 456 represents the dawn breaking (a cockerel's crow, played on the melody) and the skeletons returning to their graves. Source: Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danse_Macabre) and other sources. I created this arrangement from the orchestral work for Concert (Pedal) Harp & Strings (Violins, Violas, cellos & Basses). Sheet central : | Danse macabre en sol mineur (24 sheet music) | | |||
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