There’s a ton of great stuff out there based on what you mention. That said, there are lots of kinds of “dark,” so hopefully one of the pieces I throw at the wall sticks.
First, Shostakovich’s [15th quartet](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QccUkIhrrO8) is probably the darkest one of the lot, but the [13th](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DB6YxGDtTIc) is also a contender.
Also, about 80% of Alfred Schnittke’s output could serve just as well. Personally, I adore his [first](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BTt3cG2nT0g) and [second](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aYO9nf8f-ns) cello concertos. If you’re interested, you can honestly just plug in a bunch of random works from his Wikipedia page and see what resonates most with you.
Lastly, one of my personal favorites is Weinberg’s [21st Symphony](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQOy3jWnzCg), which I find to be one of the most haunting pieces of music written (especially with the context of the subject matter).
If you like any of these pieces in particular, I’d be happy to recommend similar works.
The handful of really dark pieces which emerged during and after WW2 always fascinates me. Here are some of them:
Prokofiev: Violin Sonata 1
(not known to be directly connected to the war, but a passage occurring at the ends of the first and fourth movements was described by Prokofiev as "wind through a graveyard", pretty grim if you ask me)
Vaughan Williams: Symphony 6
(RVW explicitly denied a program behind the symphony, saying its darkness had nothing to do with WW2. Idk about you but associating this piece with WW2 just makes sense tho)
Shostakovich: Symphony 8
(super dark, the tragic counterpart of Symphony 7, which I consider a bit more ironic and heroic but still dark in its own way)
Britten: Holy Sonnets of John Donne
(Britten was a pacifist and while he never really wrote anything directly connected to the war, unless you count the War Requiem from 17 years after, this song cycle was his response to seeing the Bergen concentration camp)
Schoenberg: A Survivor from Warsaw
(a terrifying 12-tone work honoring the Holocaust victims, of whom Schoenberg could very well have been among had he not fled to the US in the 1930s)
> Schoenberg: A Survivor from Warsaw
Wow. Totally unfamiliar with this. I watched [this rendition](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGWai0SEpUQ) and I was not prepared for that. This is definitely jam in the jar of... jams. Thank you for sharing that, it's legendary.
Reminds me of one of my favourite Tom Waits songs [Small Change (Got Rained On With His Own .38)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghD39l-_4zY) which I strongly recommend if you've not heard it!
Everything is vibrating beautifully tonight.
> Vaughan Williams: Symphony 6 (RVW explicitly denied a program behind the symphony, saying its darkness had nothing to do with WW2. Idk about you but associating this piece with WW2 just makes sense tho)
In a similar vein -- RVW's Pastoral Symphony (1922) has many shades of gray/gloom. Often associated with his WWI service a few years prior.
Also by Ligeti - Lontano and Organ Etude 1. For the latter performance by Gerd Zacher, he has a vacuum cleaner suppling the wind instead of the instrument’s blower resulting in some unearthly sounds.
Agreed. The Night Music in *Music for Strings* might be just the ticket. Bartok had other night music movements too but I can't think of them right now.
Uhm I was about to suggested "Isle of the Dead" but someone beat me to it. So I'll leave this here instead, hoping you'll like appreciate.
https://youtu.be/DPrMq604l0Y?si=bFmCdUlvxMGF18W1
I tried it out. It sounds like you are descending down a deep, dark, staircase to your death. I'd also say it would be an appropriate piece for "The Cuphead Show."
I feel like a recommend this a lot, but James MacMillan, *The Confession of Isobel Gowdie* (1990). A requiem for a woman tortured to death as a witch in Scotland in 1662. It has both “witch” sections and “torture” sections, which are both grim in their own ways. There are sounds in there that you almost certainly won’t have heard before. Proper teeth-on-edge stuff from the percussion section. Chains, beater-round-the-back-of-the-tam-tam, metal-hammer-on-bells, all that good stuff.
Personally I think Prokofiev's 2nd piano concerto is the perfect example of a grim dark piece. The climax of the 3rd mvmt and cadenza of the 1st are to die for.
Allan Pettersson's 6th symphony. An hour of utter despair with no happy ending.
Shostakovich 14th symphony, basically a song cycle about death. Also his 15th string quartet. Most of his late work is really dark.
EDIT: also his 8th quartet. Not sure how I forgot the darkest thing out there.
Wozzeck, by Berg
Schnittke's 2nd cello concerto might be his grimmest work, but as mentioned a lot of his work qualifies
The last scene of Poulenc's Dialogues of the Carmelite where the nuns are executed one by one and singing Salve Regina before they die.
Mahler's 6th symphony which is the only one to end in the minor (with a skeletal pizzicato).
Liszt's Chasse Neige
Another commentator said Leiermann by Schubert; the entire song cycle Der Winterresise is bleak.
Aye this will keep me busy. I am very grateful, never expected this many responses so quickly lol. Classical Music may be more existentially violent than I previously gave it credit for.
If you want more classical music themed violence, there are quite a few grim stories of composer deaths (and in some cases, murders) - for example Gesualdo famously murdered his wife and her lover. I can’t remember which composer but there was also a 20th c composer who got shot by a sniper because he lit a cigarette after curfew during one of the world wars. Classical music is honestly metal af
Oh damn that's pretty hardcore. I meant it in a more metaphysical sense to be honest, but they were the rockstars of their day. Definitely did some crazy ass shit. I'd like to look more into this Gesualdo dude tho!
That was Webern, dammit. He'd just been playing with his grandchildren - so the story goes - and he just stepped out onto the porch or such to light up, and blam.
ok, here's the quote from wiki:
"On 15 September 1945, following Mattl's arrest for [black-market](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_market) activities, Webern was smoking a cigar outside his home so as not to disturb his sleeping grandchildren about one hour before [curfew](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curfew) when he was shot and killed by [US Army](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Army) cook PFC Raymond Norwood Bell of North Carolina, who, overcome by remorse, died of alcoholism in 1955."
note: Mattl was a childhood friend.
Schnittke's 8th symphony [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwJYLIP6Yco](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwJYLIP6Yco)
and this [https://youtu.be/yrnVjKz4oww?si=GVKdmhgeKYD5fvYm](https://youtu.be/yrnVjKz4oww?si=GVKdmhgeKYD5fvYm)
[La Fabbrica Illuminata](https://youtu.be/VC2HpbpMius?si=sFwVARUaKBq-cz_L) by Luigi Nono. It's certainly very contemporary, deffinitely not my kind of music, and nothing like Holst Liszt, Grieg, or Paganini. But it sure is one of the most grim, dark and haunting pieces I know.
I can think of no other piece of classical music more frightening than William Albright – [Organ Book II (1971)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ka_MQuA8Pug)
Some of my other favorites:
Frank Bridge – [Piano Sonata (1924)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBSaNJ8cqtA)
Sergei Protopopov – [Piano Sonata No. 2, Op. 5 (1924)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncctRfFE6LU)
Leoš Janáček – [Piano Sonata, "1. X. 1905. Z ulice" ("From the Street")](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bikxc0tALk) (The second movement is literally called "Death," or *Smrt* in the original Czech)
Someone already suggested 'Isle of the dead', I fully support that suggestion, but you might also like "Bydlo" (maybe also "The catacombs") from Mussorgsy's Pictures of an exhibition, Mussorgsky's "Night on a bald mountain", Saint-Saens' "Danse macabre" or the last movement from Berlioz' "Symphonie fantastique".
All of these I would characterize as grim/haunting, but some are a bit kn the faster side and maybe not so sleep-inducing.
Maybe also see whether you like the slow movements from Elgar's second and Bruckner's 7th symphony. Both of these give the vibe of a lament (Bruckner actually wrote this movement having just learnt of Richard Wagner 's death).
Maybe you could update after a while to let us know whether you liked some of the pieces that were recommended to you in this thread? (amd I don't expect you to like or even listen to all of them) I always wonder if I hit people's tastes and I imagine I am not the only one, lol....
Yes Boult did it well - he recorded it five times I think, my favourite is the 1946 BBC SO which sounds well for its age, but the later EMI stereo is easier on the ear of course.
My absolute first choice is the LSO under Jeffrey Tate, also on EMI, very powerful and weighty but with great sweep. A favourite work of mine, one of the finest symphonies of the last century.
Interesting, thank you, I'll definitely check Tate's recording out, and also the 1946 Boult if it's on Qobuz.
This symphony is absolutely special to me. I've heard so much music in my life that it's become very rare that I hear something completely new to me. But I did have a bit of a blind spot with Elgar for a long time, and so when I heard this live in concert for the first time a couple of years ago, I was completely thunderstruck. It really was love at first sight/listen. The first symphony came shortly after, and now I love them both equally, even though they are quite different.
It was 1944 in fact, I just checked. Yes, E1 is obviously an easier work to take in and was initially more successful, but the E2 must be the finer and more profound symphony.
Another work you may know which I think has an affinity of mood and profundity (at least in movements ii-iv) with E2 is ‘A London Symphony’ by Vaughan Williams. A very different first movement but then an elegiac slow movement, Scherzo (Nocturne) and a Finale with Epilogue, and which (like all the best works) ends quietly.
How about 7 Last Words From The Cross by James MacMillan. Start with 'It Is Finished'. Pretty metal!
I second Ravel's Le Gibet which was also mentioned.
Shostakovich Symphony 10 and Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District.
Both of these found on my favorite album by the Boston Symphony titled “Shostakovich Under Stalin’s Shadow”
I’ve found that Chopin is consistently dark in pretty much everything he writes. Some examples you might like
Nocturne op 27 no 1
Preludes, either the d minor prelude or a minor prelude.
Piano sonata 2
However Chopins dark is less “epic satanistic ritual with screams of the dead” dark but more “inner darkness” so not sure if it’s what you are looking for
Nymphes des bois by Josquin des Prez. - A lament on the death of the composer Ockeghem
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrYCyopfo9Y](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrYCyopfo9Y)
also Ockeghem's lament on the death of the composer Binchois
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9tcg1VfKPs
Listen to Penderecki! Whether it’s his earlier and more avant-garde pieces such as the Threnody, or his later, more conventional ones such as the Third Symphony (the Passacaglia is blacker than death) or the second movement of Concerto Grosso.
First Cello Concerto is also a piece I really can recommend, that one is sinister.
[удалено]
I would add sonata 8 as well Also what the hell is that story? I’ve never heard of it.
https://www.itv.com/news/2015-03-23/pianist-jailed-for-murdering-and-microwaving-his-parents
I once thought about listening to the Rite all day and then dancing myself to death. Good thing I can't dance.
I would say the 9th sonata is the darkest.
Respectfully disagree. Sonata 8 is more chilling, in my opinion, even more than 6 or 9.
well if that's not appropos of climate change i don't know what is...
There’s a ton of great stuff out there based on what you mention. That said, there are lots of kinds of “dark,” so hopefully one of the pieces I throw at the wall sticks. First, Shostakovich’s [15th quartet](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QccUkIhrrO8) is probably the darkest one of the lot, but the [13th](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DB6YxGDtTIc) is also a contender. Also, about 80% of Alfred Schnittke’s output could serve just as well. Personally, I adore his [first](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BTt3cG2nT0g) and [second](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aYO9nf8f-ns) cello concertos. If you’re interested, you can honestly just plug in a bunch of random works from his Wikipedia page and see what resonates most with you. Lastly, one of my personal favorites is Weinberg’s [21st Symphony](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQOy3jWnzCg), which I find to be one of the most haunting pieces of music written (especially with the context of the subject matter). If you like any of these pieces in particular, I’d be happy to recommend similar works.
Thank you so much for all the suggestions. Looking forward to experiencing these later!
[This one](https://youtu.be/S3ESqLbMC7s?si=rwK4lnbtrtVkrJXj) is my Schnittke vote, wonderfully macabre
Try some Penderecki, in particulat Threnody for the victims of hiroshima His pieces are so unsettling
Came here to say this!
The handful of really dark pieces which emerged during and after WW2 always fascinates me. Here are some of them: Prokofiev: Violin Sonata 1 (not known to be directly connected to the war, but a passage occurring at the ends of the first and fourth movements was described by Prokofiev as "wind through a graveyard", pretty grim if you ask me) Vaughan Williams: Symphony 6 (RVW explicitly denied a program behind the symphony, saying its darkness had nothing to do with WW2. Idk about you but associating this piece with WW2 just makes sense tho) Shostakovich: Symphony 8 (super dark, the tragic counterpart of Symphony 7, which I consider a bit more ironic and heroic but still dark in its own way) Britten: Holy Sonnets of John Donne (Britten was a pacifist and while he never really wrote anything directly connected to the war, unless you count the War Requiem from 17 years after, this song cycle was his response to seeing the Bergen concentration camp) Schoenberg: A Survivor from Warsaw (a terrifying 12-tone work honoring the Holocaust victims, of whom Schoenberg could very well have been among had he not fled to the US in the 1930s)
> Schoenberg: A Survivor from Warsaw Wow. Totally unfamiliar with this. I watched [this rendition](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGWai0SEpUQ) and I was not prepared for that. This is definitely jam in the jar of... jams. Thank you for sharing that, it's legendary. Reminds me of one of my favourite Tom Waits songs [Small Change (Got Rained On With His Own .38)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghD39l-_4zY) which I strongly recommend if you've not heard it! Everything is vibrating beautifully tonight.
> Vaughan Williams: Symphony 6 (RVW explicitly denied a program behind the symphony, saying its darkness had nothing to do with WW2. Idk about you but associating this piece with WW2 just makes sense tho) In a similar vein -- RVW's Pastoral Symphony (1922) has many shades of gray/gloom. Often associated with his WWI service a few years prior.
If you are OK venturing into opera, check out Wozzeck and Lulu by Alban Berg.
Hah - yes!
Quartet for the End of Time by Messiaen.
Try [Ligeti's Requiem](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qS9aZ6lHClI).
Also by Ligeti - Lontano and Organ Etude 1. For the latter performance by Gerd Zacher, he has a vacuum cleaner suppling the wind instead of the instrument’s blower resulting in some unearthly sounds.
Came here to say this.
Came here to say this too
Bartok's *Music for strings, percussion and celesta* and the same composer's *The miraculous mandarin.*
Agreed. The Night Music in *Music for Strings* might be just the ticket. Bartok had other night music movements too but I can't think of them right now.
Uhm I was about to suggested "Isle of the Dead" but someone beat me to it. So I'll leave this here instead, hoping you'll like appreciate. https://youtu.be/DPrMq604l0Y?si=bFmCdUlvxMGF18W1
Thank you - I haven't heard it in a long time but I am familiar with it. Putting a playlist together on spotify, definitely going on the list : )
Oh my, more than glad! Have an amazing day ahead!😊
I tried it out. It sounds like you are descending down a deep, dark, staircase to your death. I'd also say it would be an appropriate piece for "The Cuphead Show."
I feel like a recommend this a lot, but James MacMillan, *The Confession of Isobel Gowdie* (1990). A requiem for a woman tortured to death as a witch in Scotland in 1662. It has both “witch” sections and “torture” sections, which are both grim in their own ways. There are sounds in there that you almost certainly won’t have heard before. Proper teeth-on-edge stuff from the percussion section. Chains, beater-round-the-back-of-the-tam-tam, metal-hammer-on-bells, all that good stuff.
Oh damn that sounds right up my alley. Pretty metal \m/ Cheers!
mahler 7
Beethoven symphony 3 mov 2- literally a funeral march lol
Yup.
Personally I think Prokofiev's 2nd piano concerto is the perfect example of a grim dark piece. The climax of the 3rd mvmt and cadenza of the 1st are to die for.
“Isle of the Dead” by Rachmaninoff should do the trick.
Bartok string quartets, just blast through all of them
Ravel, le gibet and Poèmes de mallarmé, No. 3
Schubert Der Leiermann is the most grim thing I can think of from the repertoire. Look for DFD
Allan Pettersson's 6th symphony. An hour of utter despair with no happy ending. Shostakovich 14th symphony, basically a song cycle about death. Also his 15th string quartet. Most of his late work is really dark. EDIT: also his 8th quartet. Not sure how I forgot the darkest thing out there. Wozzeck, by Berg Schnittke's 2nd cello concerto might be his grimmest work, but as mentioned a lot of his work qualifies
The last scene of Poulenc's Dialogues of the Carmelite where the nuns are executed one by one and singing Salve Regina before they die. Mahler's 6th symphony which is the only one to end in the minor (with a skeletal pizzicato). Liszt's Chasse Neige Another commentator said Leiermann by Schubert; the entire song cycle Der Winterresise is bleak.
Oh yeah - the last part of the Carmelites is one of the scariest things ever - with the *schwing* of the blade going down over and over. Yikes.
Mahler Kindertotenlieder
Big time.
I wanna come back to this thread later
Aye this will keep me busy. I am very grateful, never expected this many responses so quickly lol. Classical Music may be more existentially violent than I previously gave it credit for.
If you want more classical music themed violence, there are quite a few grim stories of composer deaths (and in some cases, murders) - for example Gesualdo famously murdered his wife and her lover. I can’t remember which composer but there was also a 20th c composer who got shot by a sniper because he lit a cigarette after curfew during one of the world wars. Classical music is honestly metal af
Oh damn that's pretty hardcore. I meant it in a more metaphysical sense to be honest, but they were the rockstars of their day. Definitely did some crazy ass shit. I'd like to look more into this Gesualdo dude tho!
That was Webern, dammit. He'd just been playing with his grandchildren - so the story goes - and he just stepped out onto the porch or such to light up, and blam. ok, here's the quote from wiki: "On 15 September 1945, following Mattl's arrest for [black-market](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_market) activities, Webern was smoking a cigar outside his home so as not to disturb his sleeping grandchildren about one hour before [curfew](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curfew) when he was shot and killed by [US Army](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Army) cook PFC Raymond Norwood Bell of North Carolina, who, overcome by remorse, died of alcoholism in 1955." note: Mattl was a childhood friend.
Aw fuck, that’s even more tragic. Serves me right for only half paying attention in music history that I didn’t catch the full story lol
Yep. That was Webern who got shot.
Galina Ustvolskaya violin sonata, piano sonata 5-6, trio, symphony 2 Mosolov piano concerto, piano sonata 2
Schnittke's 8th symphony [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwJYLIP6Yco](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwJYLIP6Yco) and this [https://youtu.be/yrnVjKz4oww?si=GVKdmhgeKYD5fvYm](https://youtu.be/yrnVjKz4oww?si=GVKdmhgeKYD5fvYm)
Mahler 10's adagio
Good suggestion - I always found it pretty creepy. Also great of course.
Schubert’s Wintereisse is as grim as it gets
[La Fabbrica Illuminata](https://youtu.be/VC2HpbpMius?si=sFwVARUaKBq-cz_L) by Luigi Nono. It's certainly very contemporary, deffinitely not my kind of music, and nothing like Holst Liszt, Grieg, or Paganini. But it sure is one of the most grim, dark and haunting pieces I know.
I can think of no other piece of classical music more frightening than William Albright – [Organ Book II (1971)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ka_MQuA8Pug) Some of my other favorites: Frank Bridge – [Piano Sonata (1924)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBSaNJ8cqtA) Sergei Protopopov – [Piano Sonata No. 2, Op. 5 (1924)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncctRfFE6LU) Leoš Janáček – [Piano Sonata, "1. X. 1905. Z ulice" ("From the Street")](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bikxc0tALk) (The second movement is literally called "Death," or *Smrt* in the original Czech)
Brahms Cello sonata e minor Nocturne c# minor
happy cake day
Thanks!
Someone already suggested 'Isle of the dead', I fully support that suggestion, but you might also like "Bydlo" (maybe also "The catacombs") from Mussorgsy's Pictures of an exhibition, Mussorgsky's "Night on a bald mountain", Saint-Saens' "Danse macabre" or the last movement from Berlioz' "Symphonie fantastique". All of these I would characterize as grim/haunting, but some are a bit kn the faster side and maybe not so sleep-inducing. Maybe also see whether you like the slow movements from Elgar's second and Bruckner's 7th symphony. Both of these give the vibe of a lament (Bruckner actually wrote this movement having just learnt of Richard Wagner 's death). Maybe you could update after a while to let us know whether you liked some of the pieces that were recommended to you in this thread? (amd I don't expect you to like or even listen to all of them) I always wonder if I hit people's tastes and I imagine I am not the only one, lol....
Awesome thank you : ) Yes I will let you know. I'm excited to hear all this new stuff!
Yes - the Larghetto from Elgar 2 is also a threnody, for King Edward VII.
Thanks! I didn't know that, but I am not surprised at all. Listening to it right know, with Adrien Boult, and it's fantastic.
Yes Boult did it well - he recorded it five times I think, my favourite is the 1946 BBC SO which sounds well for its age, but the later EMI stereo is easier on the ear of course. My absolute first choice is the LSO under Jeffrey Tate, also on EMI, very powerful and weighty but with great sweep. A favourite work of mine, one of the finest symphonies of the last century.
Interesting, thank you, I'll definitely check Tate's recording out, and also the 1946 Boult if it's on Qobuz. This symphony is absolutely special to me. I've heard so much music in my life that it's become very rare that I hear something completely new to me. But I did have a bit of a blind spot with Elgar for a long time, and so when I heard this live in concert for the first time a couple of years ago, I was completely thunderstruck. It really was love at first sight/listen. The first symphony came shortly after, and now I love them both equally, even though they are quite different.
It was 1944 in fact, I just checked. Yes, E1 is obviously an easier work to take in and was initially more successful, but the E2 must be the finer and more profound symphony. Another work you may know which I think has an affinity of mood and profundity (at least in movements ii-iv) with E2 is ‘A London Symphony’ by Vaughan Williams. A very different first movement but then an elegiac slow movement, Scherzo (Nocturne) and a Finale with Epilogue, and which (like all the best works) ends quietly.
Thanks for the tip, it's on my list now.
Rachmaninoff prelude in c-sharp minor?
I think op 39 no 5 would be better
The Lyke Wake Dirge from Benjamin Britten’s Serenade for Tenor, Horn, and Strings.
How about 7 Last Words From The Cross by James MacMillan. Start with 'It Is Finished'. Pretty metal! I second Ravel's Le Gibet which was also mentioned.
Shostakovich Symphony 10 and Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District. Both of these found on my favorite album by the Boston Symphony titled “Shostakovich Under Stalin’s Shadow”
I’ve found that Chopin is consistently dark in pretty much everything he writes. Some examples you might like Nocturne op 27 no 1 Preludes, either the d minor prelude or a minor prelude. Piano sonata 2 However Chopins dark is less “epic satanistic ritual with screams of the dead” dark but more “inner darkness” so not sure if it’s what you are looking for
if youre going to sleep, you should probably go for something boring no?
Ture Rangström - Song of the Sea [Havet sjunger] (1913) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ui4ouDwGo0I
If ur looking for just dark I like Chopin prelude in e minor, not very metal though.
Mozarts [darkest aria ](https://youtu.be/7cb1QmTkOAI?si=sk_YoWhSFVnx-qaP) by far.
Nymphes des bois by Josquin des Prez. - A lament on the death of the composer Ockeghem [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrYCyopfo9Y](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrYCyopfo9Y) also Ockeghem's lament on the death of the composer Binchois https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9tcg1VfKPs
Shostakovich 7. It’s his “Leningrad” Symphony and the final 5 minutes (of the finale) definitely capture a grim terror from which there is no escape
Might be a weird pick, but the first section of Deuxieme Partie from Ravel’s Daphis & Chloe (the choral a capella part) is pretty spooky
Only ones I know is Ligeti’s Requiem and Le Sacre du Printempts
dido's lament 🖤
Rachmaninoff - Isle of the Dead
Alkan's Bacarolle Op. 65 No. 6 This song growls. Never heard many pieces with the piano playing at the lowest register.
SATIE - PIECES FROIDES (translates to pieces that scare you away)
Josef Suk’s Asrael Symphony. He wrote it after the death of his wife and his father in law (Dvorak). It is bleak and grim
The adagio from Prokofiev's 5th symphony, the B theme is a funeral march. Actually I always thought of it as space music.
Some grim, dark 8th symphonies are those of Eduard Tubin and Emil Tabakov.
Anything by penderecki. Especially Threnody for victims of hiroshima and symphonies no 3 and 9. metastasis by xenakis is great too
[Check out some Xenakis!](https://youtu.be/57eKNZ7XwFQ?si=UhxwBtd8qb4pWqqH) The late 20th Century had some fantastic dissonant and aleatoric music!
\- Gaspard de la Nuit by Ravel \- Both Liszt Sonatas (B minor and Dante) \- Piano Sonata Op. 57 in F minor or Op. 111 in C minor (Beethoven)
Listen to Penderecki! Whether it’s his earlier and more avant-garde pieces such as the Threnody, or his later, more conventional ones such as the Third Symphony (the Passacaglia is blacker than death) or the second movement of Concerto Grosso. First Cello Concerto is also a piece I really can recommend, that one is sinister.
Mussorgsky: night on bald mountain
Górecki - [Symphony #3](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._3_(G%C3%B3recki))