In your opinion, what is the greatest symphonic poem of all time?

Question

'Also Sprach Zarathustra' and 'Les Preludes' are probably the most popular, but I am looking for a fresher perspective. Please give me your reasons.

My bad! I sometimes use the terms 'Symphonic Poem' and 'Tone Poem' interchangably. Essentially, I am speaking of one and the same.

Answer 1

are you also a musician? Your instrument might be what leads you from one composer's works to another. My husband, a french hornist, would take most of the Strauss willingly, but that's his take on it. My violinist friends go off on a different tangent.
I'd zing you to the Mahler symphonies with vocals
(#2,3,4,8), or recommend Die Gurrelieder by Schoenberg ( it's very late Romantic, and before he got into his 12 tone phase)
Do solo concerti figure into your scheme of things?
Rachmaninoff piano concerti are a whole lot of fun, as well as Liszt's and Chopin's.
What about good ol' Night on Bald Mountain? Or the Pictures at an Exhibition? ( orchestral version)
Pines of Rome?
There's so much out there! I don't think we can listen to it all in one lifetime...

Answer 2

There seems to be a real confusion over this genre, because personally I don't subscribe to symphonic poems - I barely listen to Alsa Sprach Zarathustra in full - but I do listen to the little, shorter bits like The Four Seasons, Manfred Symphony, Francesca da Ramini, Night on Bald Mountain, May Night, and probably the most famous one, Dukas' The Sorcerer's Apprentice. And it's not even a symphony - it's a scherzo!

But if we were to consider symphonic poems as a form and not as a classification, we can include all the above. There's form in each work, and they follow the usual development found in symphonies. But most of all, they're all enjoyable, even to the untrained ear. That is my reason.

P/S: by the way, some still argued that Vivaldi's Four Seasons were not really programmatic music, that the sonnets we see in the sleeve of the CD case were written after the music was composed... so, if the arguments are true, then Vivaldi's Four Seasons are the best derivative tone poetry around.

Answer 3

I must confess to some confusion in this area. I have a hard time with the terminology. I'm not sure what constitutes a "symphonic poem," and whilst I have heard the term "tone poem" in the context of late romantic period composers, I am not sure what type of programmatic music is encompassed by this expression. Brahms railed against programmatic music, preferring the more abstract realm of non programmatic as opposed to the music as espoused by Wagner and Liszt. Comparing work by these composers I'm not sure I could say that any one was more "poetic" than another. Brahms would have taken umbrage with this term being applied to one of his symphonies. Yet I would regard those works as being highly poetic.

Having said that... of those pieces of work that are routinely classified in this manner, I would have to say that Smetana's "Ma Vlast" and in particular The Moldau would be worthy of consideration. It always seems to me that the music is appropriate for its various titles.

How would Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition" fit into this discussion? The piece was originally written for the piano and later orchestrated in a symphonic fashion. Perhaps and attempt to roll another artform into music (painting, along with poetry).

Other contributors have made a case for Beethoven's 6th to be considered. In light of the footnotes added to each movement, it would be hard to argue against it. The work is highly impressionistic and other than the fact that it foreshadows Debussy by a century, it is in and of itself a masterpiece. Whilst on the subject of impressionism in classical music, Vivaldi's Le Quattro Stagioni, which is a suite of concertos, might also be considered "tone poetry."

Just a thought.

Answer 4

Tchaikowsky's "Francesca di Rimini" does not get much playtime, and I think it's a better work tham "Romeo and Juliet". And I'm not sure how "Manfred" is classified, but it needs to be heard too. I prefer any of Tchaikovsky's work to Strauss.

In general, I have trouble with the term "symphonic poem" -- a meaningless classification, and impossible to define as a genre without either including "too many" works, or "not enough" works. How would you classify Beethoven's "Pastroral", or his battle "symphony", "Wellington's Victory" (which should never have been written)? How do we classify Debussy's "La Mer" -- it has no story. Is Debussy's music ALL program music since it is almost all subjective?

I digress............

Answer 5

Frankly, I think of Beethoven's 6th Symphony as a tone poem. Why else do the movements have subtitles that "set the scene"?

Answer 6

Maybe can be "What wonderfoul world".
Singe from Armstrong.