12 Ridiculously Underplayed Symphonic Poems 

Might as well dedicate an entire series to underplayed piano concerti alone then. And possibly also for violin concerti as they're far more abundant than any non-piano concerto and do a 3rd series for all other instruments.

@@classicallpvault8251 A perilous undertaking in the wrong hands. There are more dreadful piano concertos on RU-vid, all celebrated as criminally underrated masterpieces, than I can count. Luckily Hurwitz's discernment is finely honed, and he would omit all the dross, picking only the worthy sleepers. He did, after all, introduce me to the Tippett concerto, so props to him!

@@bobschaaf2549 The Kiel and Rubinstein 1st Concerto are hidden gems that should be played more often.

Tschaikowskys Hamlet is a swashbuckler film music! Liszt Hamlet is much better. A precise character study, not music Kitsch!

Hamlet is great however I think the even more rarely played The Tempest is even better 😁

BOY, you said it. There's a lot more outstanding pieces by Dvorak other than the ones you mentioned.

The Violin Concerto, the Slavonic Dances and the String/Wind Serenades also get a fair number of outings. On the other hand the wonderful Symphonic Variations and Scherzo Capriccioso are virtually unheard nowadays.

Dvorak’s “Noonday Witch”. is one of my favourite tone poems. Absolutely brilliant work, IMO up there with the best ever written.

@@TheVaughan5 I was introduced to it when Neeme Jarvi and the Scottish National Orchestra paired it with Dvorak's 6th Symphony on a release in the 1980s, which was great. It tells its story very colourfully yet succinctly, more so than the other Dvorak tone poems I feel. A much-valued recording; at the time the only good CD alternative for the 6th was Kertesz, but Jarvi was punchier.

Totally agree! Bax was a great composer but some of his works lack truly memorable themes. Not so with “In Memoriam”, which is one of the most noble and beautiful pieces of music known to me. Along with “Tintagel” and “November Woods”, it’s undoubtedly one of Bax’s finest tone poems and deserves much more acclaim.

Again, almost anything by Bax is neglected. I hardly know his music and it's hard to get a chance to hear it. In Bernard Shore's "Sixteen Symphonies" of 1948, covering pieces all well-known at the time ranging from Haydn to Walton, the only one that is no longer in the repertory is Bax's Third.

It was Holst's favorite too, I believe, or certainly one of them.

I'd second Tamara

At Burning Man in the aughts, the theme was Psyche. I went dressed as Franck. One guy guessed who it was.

Wonderful piece. Should be performed more, but no one does cantatas anymore.

Stay tuned...

Yeah, like Les Preludes and Piano Concerto No. 1. Let's hear MAZEPPA (Symphonic Poem No. 6) once in awhile or List's version of the Rakoczy March instead of the one by Berlioz.

Because no one cares about Berwald (and I love his music). For my money the first tone poem is Haydn's Representation of Chaos from The Creation, but you can always go back farther.

@@DavesClassicalGuide Yes, we can actually go back to Sakada's pythian nomos, depicting Apollo's fight with the dragon.... Well, Haydn describes chaos, but it is not a symphonic poem standing on its own. In that case we have Biber's Battaglia or Vivaldi's The four seasons. But if we talk about romantic orchestral music in one piece, describing something particular, I think we can start with Wellingtons Sieg... I also think The Midsummer night's dream, The Hebrides, Meerstille und glückliche Fahrt, Ruy Blas etc. can be called symphonic poems, though they were still called "uvertures" at the time (the 1820:s).

Liszt was the first to put the name to the artistic phenomenon that had outgrown its early confines as the "overture". People (artists and audiences) were certainly more disposed towards this kind of thing in the Romantic Century. The "descriptive" pieces of music that came before had different aesthetic about them, engaging and/or dramatic as they were. Like, Rebel's "Les Elemens" is still a suite; and Vivaldi's "The Four Seasons" - still a set of concertos (and he as not the first to play around with the evocation of seasons, either). I agree about Berwald's symphonic "paintings", but he can't be credited except retrospectively, since most of them were unknown then, and remain so to this day (admittedly, I have heard the names, but not the music - maybe you can recommend a good recording?..). It seems like the composer himself did not make a big deal out of his "invention", so the the laurels went to Liszt. Not undeservedly, though, he did a lot to popularize the "New German" school.

@@bigg2988 I think the only new thing Liszt did was giving them the label "symphonic poem"... Besides, many of his own such works were originally overtures, e.g. Hamlet, Tasso, Les préludes and Prometheus. Or they were reworkings of older music, e.g. Mazeppa and Hungaria. For Berwald's works, they are not unknown at all, but regrettably not appreciated very much outside Scandinavia. But Dave has done a lot to promote him. I can recommend Ulf Björlin with the Royal Philharmonic on EMI. They play all the 4 symphonies, the piano and violin concertos, 2 overtures and 5 of the symphonic poems. All really high class music and worth getting to know!!

@@laggeman1396Thank you!

No.

You just need to listen until it sinks in. It does after a couple of tries.

The Tchaikovsky HAMLET is tops and as Dave mentioned THE TEMPEST is just fantastic, but you hardly ever hear it. Dvorak's THE WOOD DOVE is my most favorite of his symphonic poems, but who can really choose, they're all masterpieces.

Did you know that Joseph Joachim, known mostly for his violin concertos, also wrote a Hamlet Overture? It’s a very appealing work, and sounds like it may have influenced Brahms’ Tragic Overture (written some 27 years later).

Will have to check J. J.'s Hamlet out.