Evocation of bells in music.

[lisa needs braces]

Is that a bell in the final movement of Mahler's 2nd?

[pjme]

Percussion in Mahler's second symphony : Requires total of seven players)

Timpani (2 players and 8 timpani, with a third player in the last movement using two of the second timpanist's drums)
Several Snare Drums
Bass Drum
Cymbals
Triangle
Glockenspiel
bells (Mahler requires that they be steel bars of deep,
indefinite, but widely-differentiated pitch)
Rute, to be played on the shell of the bass drum ( an unusual instrument, made of many pieces of
rattan, it looks like a large clothes-brush or small broom, and is used to
play the bass drum (sometimes on the shell of the instrument). It is
used only in the third movement
2 Tam-tams (high and low)
Offstage Percussion in Movement 5:
Bass drum with cymbals attached (played by the same percussionist), Triangle, Timpani

It's the tam-tams that make most noise in the finale. ( tam tams look like gongs, but are not tuned (gongs can be tuned) - they are flatter and make a more "spreading" sound.

P.

[schweitzeralan]

Bells appear literally and programmatically in many many scores, and I was just curious to see if we could list them here with any success. I'm more interested when a composer has used other instruments to evoke bells ringing, than use of actual bells, but both are fine!

Here's what I came up with with from my itunes library:

Barber - Le clocher chante from his french song cycle, Mélodies Passagères op.27. A lovely song, with the main chord closely related to one that Ravel uses in his La Vallee Des Cloches. Also Church bell at night from the Hermit Songs op.29 which is a beautiful little example of scene painting with the bare minimum of notes and maximum economy of gesture.

Ives - Those Evening Bells - an early song, and one of the best before he found his true voice.

Ravel - La Vallee Des Cloches from Miroirs. Ravel in his most purely beautiful and subtle mode, which is about as beautiful and subtle as you can be! There's also Entre-Cloches from Sites Auriclaires for two pianos.

Debussy - Cloches A Travers Les Feuilles from Images 2ieme serié. Another wonderful piece.

Bach - The Prelude from the Sixth suite for solo cello - not explicitly stated by the composer, but as clearly an evocation of bells as any of the others mentioned here. There is a DVD in which Rostropovich tells us of a dream he had of two churches, one distant, one near, with their bells pealing and how it relates to this movement (I have never heard it played better by anyone else).

Messiaen - cloches d'angoisse et larmes d'adieu from his 8 preludes - quite Debussian, though clearly Messiaen. Not my favourite Messiaen opus this, though this piece is lovely.

Langgaard - Bells Pealing: Look! He Comes from Music of the Spheres.

Ottevanger - Evening Bell- Birds Circle from Through the Year. I best not comment (I'll leave it to the composer!) other than to say I really like this one and find it very touching.

Rachmaninov's The Bells I have only heard once a couple of year ago, but I don't remember any actual immitations of the sound of bells in the score. I might be wrong though, as I say, it was ages ago that I heard it!




Part's Tintinnabulum style obviously has to do with bells on one level, but I'm not sure I can think of an instance in which he is deliberately referring to or trying to evoke the sounds of a bell. The Cantus for Benjamin Britten contains a prominant part for a bell.

Any others?

Enescu's "Poeme Rouman," an early work of the composer, is a symphonic suite which describes, in his own words, the "distant impression of familiar images of home."  Interesting work. The Arte Nova CD also includes the "Vox Maris," and the "Voix de la nature."

[schweitzeralan]

Bells appear literally and programmatically in many many scores, and I was just curious to see if we could list them here with any success. I'm more interested when a composer has used other instruments to evoke bells ringing, than use of actual bells, but both are fine!

Here's what I came up with with from my itunes library:

Barber - Le clocher chante from his french song cycle, Mélodies Passagères op.27. A lovely song, with the main chord closely related to one that Ravel uses in his La Vallee Des Cloches. Also Church bell at night from the Hermit Songs op.29 which is a beautiful little example of scene painting with the bare minimum of notes and maximum economy of gesture.

Ives - Those Evening Bells - an early song, and one of the best before he found his true voice.

Ravel - La Vallee Des Cloches from Miroirs. Ravel in his most purely beautiful and subtle mode, which is about as beautiful and subtle as you can be! There's also Entre-Cloches from Sites Auriclaires for two pianos.

Debussy - Cloches A Travers Les Feuilles from Images 2ieme serié. Another wonderful piece.

Bach - The Prelude from the Sixth suite for solo cello - not explicitly stated by the composer, but as clearly an evocation of bells as any of the others mentioned here. There is a DVD in which Rostropovich tells us of a dream he had of two churches, one distant, one near, with their bells pealing and how it relates to this movement (I have never heard it played better by anyone else).

Messiaen - cloches d'angoisse et larmes d'adieu from his 8 preludes - quite Debussian, though clearly Messiaen. Not my favourite Messiaen opus this, though this piece is lovely.

Langgaard - Bells Pealing: Look! He Comes from Music of the Spheres.

Ottevanger - Evening Bell- Birds Circle from Through the Year. I best not comment (I'll leave it to the composer!) other than to say I really like this one and find it very touching.

Rachmaninov's The Bells I have only heard once a couple of year ago, but I don't remember any actual immitations of the sound of bells in the score. I might be wrong though, as I say, it was ages ago that I heard it!




Part's Tintinnabulum style obviously has to do with bells on one level, but I'm not sure I can think of an instance in which he is deliberately referring to or trying to evoke the sounds of a bell. The Cantus for Benjamin Britten contains a prominant part for a bell.

Any others?

Quite a few postings.  One work I failed to mention was the "Manfred Symphony."  A truly late masterpiece.  Anyone appreciative of the work?

[listener]

Ellen Taaffe Zwilich  Celebration   overture
    "I wanted to celebrate a joyous and historic occasion.....The celebratory image that persistently came to me was the ringing of bells, so I allowed the work to issue from this image..."

[techniquest]

It's the tam-tams that make most noise in the finale. ( tam tams look like gongs, but are not tuned (gongs can be tuned) - they are flatter and make a more "spreading" sound.

Absolutely right. However very few recordings capture both tam-tams making the kind of noise that they should be making in the final bars of this symphony. It's the same with the bells - few recordings have the deep bells specified by Mahler.

[listener]

Thread is
      Evocation of bells in music.

I would take this to mean bell-sounds not produced by bells.      Brass wind instruments have bells, but I don't think that's the meaning of the topic.

[eyeresist]

Listener, I think the posters were indulging in a brief off-topic discussion, not misinterpretting the thread subject.

[Ten thumbs]

Here is a rare one I've discovered by Theodor Kirchner. Kirchner was a pianist-composer who suffered because he was not a virtuoso. Nevertheless, he wrote some excellent music. He evokes bells in Op. 18 Legenden (Dichtungen) no.8 with a good deal of polyphony too.

[techniquest]

Have we mentioned the evocation of bells in Britten's Four Sea Interludes yet? The horns do a fine job of evoking both the clanging and the ringing of bells. (I know that there is a real bell later in these Interludes, but wouldn't want to upset anyone... )

[Archaic Torso of Apollo]

For evocation, it's hard to top William Byrd's "The Bells," played on harpsichord:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmbbmQmepys

[aurelius]

Boris Tishchenko (b1939 Ukriane) - Sonata no7 for Piano with Bells, in C major op85 (3mvts, 18'00", 21'31", 11'58".
Total time = 51'29")  Albany CD #Troy 096).
Aurelius.

[The new erato]

I've just come across the Prelude The Bells by Boris Tchaikovsky on a Hyperion disc; and pretty striking it is too!

[schweitzeralan]

Quite a few postings.  One work I failed to mention was the "Manfred Symphony."  A truly late masterpiece.  Anyone appreciative of the work?

Listened again to the Percy Grainger orchestration of Ravel's "Valle Des Cloches." Dreamlike and transcendental; wonderful work.  Brief but memorable.

[Roy Bland]

Carillon World Federation
https://www.carillon.org/

[Roasted Swan]

A couple fo keyboard evocations (apologies in advance if already mentioned - I haven't read every post!);

Grieg - Bell-ringing (from Lyric Pieces) Op.54 No.6 - Grieg at his most impressionistic
Bax - closing pages of Piano Sonata No.1 - not specifically referred to as bells but a seeemingly clear evocation of massed Russian Bells from Bax's journey to Russia in around 1910 - a terrific concatenation of sound!

[aukhawk]

Bach's Prelude No.1 in C from the 48.

My favourite piano evocation is the Gibet middle part of Ravel's Gaspard de la Nuit.  What often annoys me, in pieces such as this or the various other Debussy and Ravel 'cloches' evocations, is when the pianist indulges in some rubato which effectively breaks the illusion of a tolling bell.

[Symphonic Addict]

Langgaard with his 4th Symphony. The Sunday Morning section evokes church bells and it's quite effective.

[Symphonic Addict]

https://www.youtube.com/v/IG28LX-lNbA

This work: Aleksander Lason: Cathedral, for orchestra (don't recall if I've talked about it previously)

It's that hell of a piece! If you have sympathy with Penderecki, Lutoslawski, Schnittke, Scelsi styles, don't miss it then!

[kyjo]

Melartin - Lyric Suite no. 3 Impressions de Belgique: V. Les cloches

https://youtu.be/D8Zu0q6BW5g

Haven't checked to see if this has been mentioned yet, but wow is this stunningly beautiful!! The highlight of a really fine orchestral suite by this lovable (by me, anyway) composer.