# The most haunting/sad tune **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 1, 2009, 7:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964 "2009-08-01T07:24:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Rayne\_Man](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/df705f/32.png) [@Rayne\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rayne_Man)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2009, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/61 "2009-08-03T19:34:52Z")
**Purcell - Music for the Funeral of Queen Mary** , as featured in _A Clockwork Orange_ [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWRcx9LHBJU](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWRcx9LHBJU) ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2009, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/62 "2009-08-03T20:18:26Z")
I always find _The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald_ movingly sad and haunting. Someone made a very nice video memorial using this song here: [![](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/hgI8bta-7aw/hqdefault.jpg "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgI8bta-7aw) ---
**Author:** ![Frostillicus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Frostillicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frostillicus)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2009, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/63 "2009-08-04T03:18:37Z")
> [@Lacunae\_Matata](#): > > I’m really not a big country music fan, but it’s my “go-to” genre when I really need a good, cathartic cry. Two of the saddest songs I’ve ever heard are George Jones’ “He Stopped Loving Her Today,” and Johnny Cash’s version of NIN’s “Cry.” If those don’t trigger tears, then adding a dose of Zevon’s “Keep Me in Your Heart” will certainly finish the job. “Waltzing Matilda,” “Vincent,” and “Danny Boy” are also wrenching. Throw in Eric Clapton’s “Tears in Heaven,” and I’m apt to collapse from dehydration or NaCl deficiency… Speaking of Johnny Cash, his songs don’t get much sadder than “I Hung My Head”. ![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/QcmbFKstspk/maxresdefault.jpg)https://www.youtube.com/embed/QcmbFKstspk?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque “I felt the power of death over life I orphaned his children; I widowed his wife.” ---
**Author:** ![salinqmind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3ec8ea/32.png) [@salinqmind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/salinqmind)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2009, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/64 "2009-08-04T03:41:48Z")
Sad: “Homeward Bound” by Simon and Garfunkle. Haunting: “Mull of Kintyre” by - Wings? and “The Long and Winding Road” (I’d like that played at my funeral). ---
**Author:** ![kelly5078](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/6f9a4e/32.png) [@kelly5078](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kelly5078)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2009, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/65 "2009-08-04T04:27:05Z")
I think “Anachie Gordon” is the saddest song I’ve ever heard. There are a few versions on youtube, but the definitive one (which is not) is by Mary Black. Some others: [Bless the Weather](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ws2QzS1GCCE) by John Martyn. [Banks of the Nile](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBmhvpiTSAU) by Fotheringay (I’m always pushing this song). “Train Song” by Eliza Carthy. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2009, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/66 "2009-08-04T04:32:05Z")
Under the Ancient Maple Tree - Heinichen (Wish I could find a copy of it) The Garden - Einsturzende Neubauten Death is the Road to Awe - Clint Mansell ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2009, 8:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/67 "2009-08-04T08:27:18Z")
_Softly and gently, dearly ransomed Soul_, the final section of _The Dream of Gerontius_. “If this doesn’t break your heart, it’s time to check in for a transplant.” Grigorio Allegri’s _Miserere mei, Deus_. We have a bunch of vain castrati to thank for the twiddly bits, which weren’t in the original and wouldn’t be in it now had said castrati not wanted to show off their high Cs. The remembrance hymn _O Valiant Hearts_. Rev’d C. Harris’s _The Supreme Sacrifice_ is such a perfect setting of it I can’t imagine why anyone ever used another tune. I cried like a little girl while singing this the year before last. ---
**Author:** ![SmashTheState](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@SmashTheState](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmashTheState)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2009, 8:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/68 "2009-08-04T08:53:56Z")
[When the Tigers Broke Free](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjFZLJA3Wqg) – Pink Floyd [The Idiot](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27ZiixkruCY) – Stan Rogers [One Tin Soldier](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7jHp7OchP0) – Original Caste [Moonlight Sonata](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQVeaIHWWck) – Ludwig von Beethoven [Sounds of Silence](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FaSFzp6IDgw) – Simon and Garfunkel [Who Would Jesus Bomb](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0KzmoXvyek) – David Rovics ---
**Author:** ![Crowbar\_of\_Irony\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f08c70/32.png) [@Crowbar\_of\_Irony\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crowbar_of_Irony_3)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2009, 9:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/69 "2009-08-04T09:54:16Z")
[Vitali Chaconne](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AloBa9SPM7U) - moving violin piece which speaks of regrets and tears (or so I feel). ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2009, 11:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/70 "2009-08-04T11:09:16Z")
[Two Little Boys](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmL3m2zcoOI) - Rolf Harris (ignore the do-it-yourself video and listen to the song). It’s a jaunty tune with a happy ending, and yet if you aren’t in tears (or at least feeling a lump in your throat) during the second chorus, well…you aren’t listening. Tangential Factoid: The Adagio in G Minor is not by Tomaso Albinoni but was written in 1945 by Albinoni scholar [Remo Giazotto](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remo_Giazotto) “based on a fragment by” Albinoni. Just thought you’d like to know. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2009, 11:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/71 "2009-08-04T11:51:31Z")
‘The Death March’ in Handel’s Samson. Of course, immediately afterwards, you get ‘Let the Bright Seraphim’. ---
**Author:** ![cjepson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a9adbd/32.png) [@cjepson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cjepson)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2009, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/72 "2009-08-04T15:21:07Z")
I love the album “Raising Sand” by Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, but I simply can not listen to the final track, “Your Long Journey”, because it’s just too sad. Maybe you have to be “of a certain age” to really feel that… to see yourself, and your loved one, getting older, and to know that one or the other of you may be feeling the sentiments of that song all too soon. I wonder if anyone here recalls the old series “The World at War”. I saw it on PBS back in the 70s. I found the theme music incredibly haunting… I’m not sure, but I think it’s an excerpt from Messaien’s “Quartet for the End of Time”, written while he was a prisoner of war in Germany, and premiered at his prison camp in 1941. I always used to find the last part of Cashman & West’s “American City Suite” to be a real tear-jerker. Oh, and Paul Simon’s “Slip Slidin’ Away” is pretty depressing. There’s a million others… “Dimming of the Day” by Richard Thompson, “Angel from Montgomery” by John Prine (actually almost anything from that album, like “Sam Stone”), “Carmelita” by Warren Zevon, “Young and Innocent Days” by the Kinks… ---
**Author:** ![Daylate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9dc877/32.png) [@Daylate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daylate)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2009, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964/73 "2009-08-04T16:07:06Z")
If you’re after haunting/sad music, a lot of songs from the Civil War definitely qualify. “All Quiet Along the Potamac”, “The Vacant Chair”, “Just Before the Battle, Mother”, and “Tenting Tonight” are good ones. It was a very sentimental age. If you search on YouTube, they are easy to find. As “All Quiet…” is probably my favorite of these, I’ve included this link. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17DLZ3IU0\_I&feature=related](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17DLZ3IU0_I&feature=related) As a parenthetical remark (just short of a hijack), evidently lots of folks think “Ashoken Farewell” dates from the Civil war. It was actually composed in 1982 by Jay Ungar, and then used as a theme in Ken Burn’s series about the Civil War, which made it very popular. It was the only contemporary piece of music in that production - all the rest of the music was from the Civil War period. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-haunting-sad-tune/504964.md?page=3)