Gloomy Sunday: The Funeral I Plan for Myself

The narrative associated with Gloomy Sunday has evolved into a legend. Both the song and its accompanying tale have received extensive coverage in prominent newspapers and magazines due to their alleged unsettling link to numerous suicides. “Gloomy Sunday” (Hungarian: Szomorú Vasárnap), often referred to as the “Hungarian Suicide Song,” is a well-known piece created by Hungarian pianist and composer Rezső Seress, first published in 1933. The composition of the song was undertaken by Rezső Seress during his residence in Paris, as he sought to establish himself as a songwriter in late 1932. The initial musical arrangement featured a piano melody in C minor, with the lyrics performed over it. Seress created the piece amidst the backdrop of the Great Depression and the rising influence of fascism in his homeland of Hungary. However, opinions vary regarding whether the song was primarily inspired by his personal sorrow or by broader concerns about the future. The essence of Seress’s lyrics conveys a critique of human injustices, accompanied by a plea to God for mercy on the contemporary world and its wrongdoers.

During his research, Mauricio Reyes uncovered two remarkable recordings in the Telekinett archives: The first, Santo, Santo, a funeral mass he recorded in San Miguel de Allende, México, features a rendition of the Rosario prayer with a haunting, almost trance-like quality that felt essential to include. The second piece, Sarah’s Letter, an eerie recording from 1953, threads a fragile human presence through the work, casting a haunting psychological shadow that grounds its more abstract elements in a deeply personal and unsettling resonance. The final segment presents a chilling narrative: a woman who fell in love with a serial killer housed at Lecumberri Prison in Mexico City, whom she called “My Beautiful Executioner.” In her letters, she described the ecstasy she felt under the weight of his violence and her longing to die at his hands, even though he was already locked away, forever out of reach.

As for Gloomy Sunday, it is not merely a piece about death or dying. It reaches further, into the shadowed corridors of the mind where despair quietly forms. It seeks to trace the contours of psychological descent: the slow unraveling, the invisible pressures, the unbearable weight of silence, grief, and disconnection. Whether that final step into the void is chosen in cold clarity or dragged from the wreckage of a mind worn down by invisible torment, “Gloomy Sunday: The Funeral I Plan for Myself” is not an elegy. It’s a dissection. A raw, unrelenting examination of the forces, internal or inflicted, that drive someone to abandon the fight and embrace the fall.

Standard Edition

Track Listing

1.  Gloomy Sunday: The Funeral I plan for Myself
Mauricio Reyes / John Duncan 1:00:00

Symbolic Ashes
Assorted Funerary Cards
Collectors Edition Card
UDP/USB Chip containing recording and ephemera
Copy of Sarah’s Letter

UPD/USB CHIP CONTENTS

1.  Gloomy Sunday: The Funeral I plan for Myself
Mauricio Reyes / John Duncan 01:00:00

2. Online Ads

3. Original Gloomy Sunday Recording “Szomorú Vasárnap”
Courtesy of the Internet Archive

4. Postcard

5. Production Notes

6. Copy of the 1956 Sarah’s Letter

7. Seress Image

8. Official Video Promos in full HD

Every Sarah box ships with a copy of the recording as a professionally made Audio CD-R

CD Contents

1.  Gloomy Sunday: The Funeral I plan for Myself
Mauricio Reyes / John Duncan 01:00:00