Hearing the Ghost 

By Pam Chaddon

When I first read The Ghost Sonata, I heard music before I understood the words. Music was central to August Strindberg’s life. He grew up in a home filled with chamber music, taught himself piano and guitar, and later hosted what he called “Beethoven evenings” in his apartment. Friends would gather to play, listen, and explore music together in an intimate setting. I imagined those evenings while shaping the music for this production. I wanted to recreate that sense of closeness, shared listening, and conversation. 

Strindberg thought musically. He even gave his chamber plays opus numbers, like musical compositions. For him, drama was not just story but musical structure, rhythm, and contrast. That idea guided my musical direction. Rather than adding background music simply to create atmosphere, I shaped the sound world like a sonata, where ideas are introduced, transformed, and eventually return. Before the play begins, you will hear the slow movement of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Piano Trio, Op. 70 No. 1, later called the “Ghost” Trio. Strindberg directly connected this work to The Ghost Sonata. Its haunting atmosphere and intimate instrumentation (violin, cello, and piano) set the tone. Strindberg was especially drawn to D minor, a key often chosen by composers for music of tragedy and the supernatural, and that color runs through much of the music in this production. 

Once the play begins, Beethoven fades from direct view, but he does not disappear. Instead, we hear from composers who influenced him and those who were influenced by him. The music becomes a kind of lineage, echoing the play’s themes of inheritance and the persistence of the past. You will hear the intricate, interwoven lines of Johann Sebastian Bach, whose fugues unfold in multiple independent voices, highlighting the complexity of the characters and their relationships. But stability slowly begins to shift. Through the solo violin music of Eugène Ysaÿe, Bach’s familiar lines are transformed and unsettled, introducing the ancient Dies Irae chant, a melody long associated with death. What begins as tradition gradually becomes something darker. 

Throughout the play, fragments of sound interrupt and shimmer. The suspended tones of Maurice Ravel create a feeling of stillness and unease. The fragile emotional world of Lili Boulanger flickers briefly and passes. The dreamlike textures of Claude Debussy seem to hover with uncertainty. The repetition in the music of Erik Satie suggests paralysis and futility. Some of these composers admired Beethoven, others resisted him, but all of them remain in conversation with him, just as the characters in the play are bound together. 

You will hear Dmitri Shostakovich’s Waltz No. 2 more than once. It may sound charming at first, even elegant. But when you listen closely, something feels slightly off. Beneath its beauty is tension. That duality reflects the world of the play, where refinement hides decay. Wordless vocalization in music by Pēteris Vasks gives voice to what cannot be spoken. A funeral march inspired by Beethoven introduces ritual and inevitability. The modern textures of Isang Yun merge East and West. As the drama descends into dream and revelation, the music becomes more fragmented and tense, mirroring the characters’ unraveling. 

Strindberg included poetry inspired by Sólarljóð, the Old Norse Song of the Sun which speaks of spiritual awakening. You will hear an original chant in Icelandic, a memory of something both ancient and human. 

In the final scene, we gradually move back in time to a musical form built on a repeating four-note descending line. In music by Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber, variations rise and fall, guiding us toward release. At the very end, we return to music connected to Bach, completing the circle. 

I struggled with whether adding music would over-explain Strindberg. In the end, I realized the play was already musical. The Ghost Sonata is dreamlike and sometimes disorienting. The music offers a shared pulse, something to hold onto emotionally even when the narrative feels unstable. 

Music is never neutral. It shapes time and feeling. Even silence has meaning. By choosing to include music, I accepted that it would guide the experience. I never wanted to add meaning to Strindberg, only to create another path toward understanding. 

If this is your first encounter with The Ghost Sonata, I hope the music draws you more deeply into Strindberg’s dream world. The play is already musical. The music simply lets us hear it. 

-Pam Chaddon