Chopin's Funeral March--Prince's Band, 1909

No Halloween season is complete without this cheerful, day-brightening ditty by Chopin (the third movement from his Piano Sonata No. 2, 1839), featuring a main motive (musical jargon for "motif") which, in my younger years, I associated with cartoon gangsters. As in, "If you don't do as we ask, Eddie, it'll be..." (main motive). It was a musical trope for "It'll be curtains for you." Anyway, Prince's Band is back, and its 12/18/1909 performance is beautifully ominous and depressing--pure Halloween. And, if you don't dig this, it'll be curtains for ya. (I'm partial to the heavy fabric variety, myself.) And you've got to love the way that this Columbia label clarifies that Chopin's Funeral march was indeed composed by Chopin. Who knew?