A Great Climax!

While working in the garden just now, my iPod switched to playing "April 5, 1242", music by Prokofiev, which he composed for the movie, "Alexander Nevsky". I remember listening to this on my walk on a very hot summer morning -- I got goose pimples!! It happened again today as I listened!

This music is also known as "The Battle on the Ice". The Teutonic Knights and the Russians, led by Nevsky, have a fantastic battle on the ice.

The Teutonic Knights, being German, sing "Peregrinus expecativi" (We are pilgrims, searching . . .) Their helmets are strange and scary! They are singing in Latin, being Catholic, which makes them appear ominous to the Russians, who are Orthodox.

The scene begins with a calm morning, the mists are flowing over the ice as each side prepares for the battle.
Gradually, gradually, the music becomes louder and louder and faster and faster as the two sides approach each other. At the end, the climax is reached as the two sides meet and begin fighting, on horseback with their swords.




Alexander Nevsky, as portrayed by an actor in the Eisenstein movie from 1938. This film can be seen as anti-German propaganda, reminding Russians of how Germany tried to take them over before and failed.

It's a great climax moment in music because it takes 5 minutes for the sound to build!