About Sad Music

You know those days when it seems like we’re at the bottom of the well? Well, great composers have captured this state of mind like no one else.

Here, I present a selection of music that evokes a sense of despair. The music is not just sad, but laden with depressive tones, with nerves on edge. The common thread is melancholy, coupled with desperate paroxysms.

Why create a selection of music that brings us down? Well, as painful as it may be, the depressive state of mind is part of the human condition, and art imitates life. Music is capable of sublimating the innermost emotions of our being. Listening to melancholic, desperate music evokes what lies within us and helps us combat this state.

Great artists possess a divine connection to express human feelings. Whether in literature, poetry, painting, or music, they can evoke scenarios and put us in emotional states through a language that is often metaphorical and abstract.

The Playlist

So, who is on this list?

Shostakovich appears frequently. The Russian composer lived in a state of threat for much of his life due to persecution by the communist regime. His work is imbued with irony, sarcasm, sadness, and despair. The second movement of his eighth string quartet is perhaps the piece that most demonstrates this state, appearing twice on this list: once in the interpretation by the Emerson String Quartet and another time by the Kronos Quartet, which manages to transform the music into something even more terrifying.

Mahler is the composer of extremes. He can touch us with the divine, but at the same time, lead us to a profound abyss. The beginning of the last movement of his first symphony is a chaotic explosion like no other in music. And what can be said of the ninth symphony, which is nicknamed the farewell symphony?

Tchaikovsky, with his sixth symphony, is the composer of depression. A weighty piece of music, which was likely his testament before his probable suicide.

I also included Richard Wagner with the dreadful prelude from the opera Tristan and Isolde. There are also the more well-known requiems by Mozart, Verdi, and Fauré. I dared to include Bach's Chaconne as desperate music, as it contains elements of that sentiment.

There are still more composers to be added to this list over time.

Don’t despair; I will also bring playlists of more joyful works that evoke softer feelings.

Listen to the playlist