Gustav Holst, The Planets (1914). I am using a solo piano reduction by Sam Lung, Hywie Davies, and Andrew Skirrow (2015).
As David Owen Norris reminds us in the introduction to this edition, Holst was an organist "and organ textures permeate the work, combining two common chords, one in each hand, as it were, with the tune deep down in the bass, like the organ pedals" (5). I admit that The Planets has always sounded to me like an organ piece transcribed (very well) for orchestra, and this solo piano version makes that all the more plausible.
The harmonic vocabulary does indeed rely heavily on ostinati, simple sustained pedal points, and juxtaposed, stacked triads and other chords. It is in the context of all this that the dominant major-ninth chord appears occasionally.
Although the appearances are few, there are some distinctive, significant moments, the first of which occurs in the fanfare section that follows the post-fortissimo break about 1/3 of the way into "Mars." A first brief rise in register goes to an AM7, the second to F9: see the reduction below.
In "Venus" the main gesture is a wedge that includes Bb9, though not as an initial or goal chord--again see below. After the first two statements of this, an undulating figure begins with Eb9 over Bb (not shown). Once moving small-notes start up nearer the end of the movement, a sequence puts a row of V9s over an Eb pedal point--again see below.
Another undulating figure opens "Saturn" (first example below) with the initial accent going to an F9. The entire collection is 5 notes of a whole-tone or Eb-F-G-A-B, which can sound like an F(#11) or B13(b5)--second example. The V9-chord sound plays out more after about 1 minute--third example--and now it is in a simple functional context.
In "Uranus," a long coda after the resounding C major triad marked ffff brings F9 and an E-B open fifth into play against one another--fourth example--mostly softly but rising just once to ff.
PS: There are two additional moments in the finale, "Neptune," not described here: they are quite similar to the ones already discussed above.
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