Okay, a few music-to-shave-by pieces. (Why? Because they make the short hairs stand up, and you get a seriously close shave that way, that’s why.)
“Intermezzo” and “Easter Hymn”, both from “Cavalleria Rusticana” by Mascagne. The Intermezzo was used as incidental music for a French film I saw once called “Le Bossu” (“The Hunchback”), which was a very enjoyable fencing-and-high-adventure movie, although the cheapskate musical director didn’t spring for an organ, and it’s the organ entry that makes this whole piece, IMHO.
Similarly, Saint-Saens’s Symphony #3 in C minor, “L’Orgue” - okay, so I obsess about the whole organ/orchestra thing, I admit it. The second movement, where you’ve got the pedals booming softly but sepulchrally deep under the beautiful slow melody on the strings, and the fourth, where the movement begins with the “giant with the iron voice” thundering out a monstrous C major chord with all the stops out, especially do it for me.
(While I’m harping on about organ and orchestra together, I’ve once or twice heard a recording of Mussorgsky’s "The Great Gate of Kiev (final movement of “Pictures at an Exhibition”) in which they bring an organ on just for the last few bars. It’s well worth it.)
And talking of Saint-Saens, he gets another vote for the ending of “Danse Macabre” where, just as the dance is reaching a frantic climax, a cock crows and Death has to let the tortured souls return to their graves as day dawns. This is reminiscent of a similar moment in Mussorgsky’s “Night on Bald Mountain”, except that there it is the tolling of a bell that breaks the spell. (My stubble just started bristling at the mere memory.)
Another “climax” moment where the composer paints a vivid picture in a few notes: Berlioz’s “Marche au Supplice” from the Symphonie Fantastique. The murderer has been dragged to the scaffold, and as he is lashed down to the guillotine the “loved one” theme comes wailing in on the top notes of the clarinet and tails off just as the strings go “Plink! Plink-plunk!”, signifying the pulling of the lever and the descent of the blade…
On a different note, there’s the “Miserere” by Grigorio Allegri, which is not only ethereally beautiful but has a whole assortment of interesting facts attached to it. First of all, the ornamentation in the high register wasn’t part of the composer’s original design but was ad-libbed by the performers, castrati jealous of their reputations. Secondly, the music wasn’t licensed for general release but was confined to (I think) the Vatican, and there wasn’t a written copy anywhere else until Mozart paid a visit, heard the piece, and later wrote it down from memory. Thirdly, the words (Psalm 51) are especially poignant as they are supposed to have been written by King David in an outpouring of grief and remorse over the whole unsavoury business with Bathsheba and Uriah the Hittite.
“Finlandia”, by Sibelius. Makes me proud to be Finnish, which is pretty amazing when you consider that I’m actually English.
Someone else’s turn now…
