Listening Log - week of 10/30

Details

"Ride of the Valkyries"
- by Richard Wagner
Category: Great Composers

The following is an excerpt from Songfacts.com (http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=28202):
"The Ride Of The Valkyries" is the popular term for the prelude to Act III of Die Walk�re, the second of the four operas by German composer Richard Wagner that comprise The Ring of the Nibelungs (German Der Ring des Nibelungen). The Ring of the Nibelungs is a sequence of four musical dramas based on the Norse saga, which concerns the turbulent family history of a race of gods and their pursuit of a magical golden ring. It began as a single opera focusing on the death of Siegfried but grew into a vast cycle of four operas comprising Das Rheingold (The Rhine Gold), Die Walk�re (The Valkyrie), Siegfried and Die Gotterdammerung (The Twilight of the Gods).

In Norse mythology, Valkyries were "angels of death" who served the god Odin. They flew over the battlefields, and chose who lived, and who died. The heroes who were chosen to die were gathered and brought to Valhalla, where they served in Odin's heavenly army.

OTHER SPOOKY MUSIC YOU MIGHT ENJOY:
"Toccata and Fugue in D minor"
by Johann Sebastian Bach

"Carmina Burana: O Fortuna"
by Carl Orff

"A Night on Bald Mountain"
by Modest Mussorgsky

"Danse Macabre"
by Camille Saint-Saens

Downloads

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