Uploaded May 2021 | Updated September 2026, 4 days ago
Performed by the Liège Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Pierre Bartholomée
Charles Tournemire (1870-1939) was a French composer and organist, considered one of the greatest organists of his time. For more on Tournemire, see the description of my score video of his sixth symphony (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_2T7...) and my blog (https://unknowncomposers.org/2018/11/...).
In my view, what makes Tournemire's eight symphonies so impressive is their evolution from 19th-century Romanticism to the edge of tonality in just three decades. While Tournemire's sixth symphony is perhaps the most impressive of his works in scope and imagination, his eighth, written in 1924, represents the culmination of his work as a symphonist. Titled "of the Triumph of Death" and dedicated to his wife, who had passed away four years earlier, it is the darkest of Tournemire's works in the genre and includes many passages without functional harmony, bordering on atonality. Harmonically, it would be difficult to guess that the fourth and eighth symphonies, for instance, are by the same composer! Despite the work's rather gloomy atmosphere, it does contain some hopeful, almost ethereal moments, embodying the composer's note on the final page: "Per aspera spera", translating from Latin as "Hope through hardships".
This work will be uploaded to IMSLP soon - keep an eye out if you would like to see the score independently.
Performed by the Liège Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Pierre Bartholomée
Charles Tournemire (1870-1939) was a French composer and organist, considered one of the greatest organists of his time. For more on Tournemire, see the description of my score video of his sixth symphony (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_2T7...) and my blog (https://unknowncomposers.org/2018/11/...).
In my view, what makes Tournemire's eight symphonies so impressive is their evolution from 19th-century Romanticism to the edge of tonality in just three decades. While Tournemire's sixth symphony is perhaps the most impressive of his works in scope and imagination, his eighth, written in 1924, represents the culmination of his work as a symphonist. Titled "of the Triumph of Death" and dedicated to his wife, who had passed away four years earlier, it is the darkest of Tournemire's works in the genre and includes many passages without functional harmony, bordering on atonality. Harmonically, it would be difficult to guess that the fourth and eighth symphonies, for instance, are by the same composer! Despite the work's rather gloomy atmosphere, it does contain some hopeful, almost ethereal moments, embodying the composer's note on the final page: "Per aspera spera", translating from Latin as "Hope through hardships".
This work will be uploaded to IMSLP soon - keep an eye out if you would like to see the score independently.
