VEGANGELICA

What are some of your favorite symphonic metal pieces? Do you feel they count as metal music?

I heard a symphonic metal piece, the Overture to "Black Symphony," for the first time yesterday and loved it.

The reason I loved it is probably that the music just sounded like classical music with a pleasing, ominous brooding feeling to it, which is typical of plain 'ol classical music.

I wouldn't have realized the song was part of the "symphonic metal" genre if I hadn't read that this is the case:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Symphony
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Within_Temptation

Within Temptation with Metropole Orchestra: "Black Symphony - Overture"
"Within Temptation" is a Dutch symphonic metal band that paired up with a symphony orchestra to create a whole album for their "Black Symphony," with this being the first movement. After listening to this, I listened to a short piece by the band Within Temptation all by themselves and was "meh" about it, but the full orchestration for "Black Symphony" is great:

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