Gustav Mahler - Auferstehung

If you have never sat through a Mahler symphony I encourage you to hear as a sample the Resurrection Symphony #2.

Here's are samples of its powerful conclusion. First with a short discussion from conductor Simon Rattle. Second without discussion and a longer final movement segment (a more substantial build up).

Third with Leonard Bernstien. Some may be annoyed with the pictures of cathedral stain glass windows at the end. Preemptively, I concede that Gustav Mahler used no biblical text for the choral portion of his Resurrection symphony but secular poetry. (Am I right?)


Rattle's comments and excerp:

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Same - only longer build up:

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Leonard Bernstien giving it all he's got:

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And if you're new to Mahler and liked that, sample the conclusion also to Mahler's 8th Symphony

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I'll check it out. I always apprecaite suggestions from knowledgable fans be it classical, folk from sonhouse, or any other form.

Never stop the discovery.

Originally posted by jaywill
If you have never sat through a Mahler symphony I encourage you to hear as a sample the [b]Resurrection Symphony #2.

Here's are samples of its powerful conclusion. First with a short discussion from conductor Simon Rattle. Second without discussion and a longer final movement segment (a more substantial build up).

Third with Leonard Bernstien. S ...[text shortened]... so to Mahler's 8th Symphony

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raop0hwX2fw&feature=related[/b]

Interesting, I spied two mandolins in the opening image of Lenny conducting!

Originally posted by sonhouse
Interesting, I spied two mandolins in the opening image of Lenny conducting!

I know Mahler employed guitar in the fourth movement of the 7th symphony as well.

Originally posted by jaywill
If you have never sat through a Mahler symphony I encourage you to hear as a sample the [b]Resurrection Symphony #2.

Here's are samples of its powerful conclusion. First with a short discussion from conductor Simon Rattle. Second without discussion and a longer final movement segment (a more substantial build up).

Third with Leonard Bernstien. S ...[text shortened]... so to Mahler's 8th Symphony

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raop0hwX2fw&feature=related[/b]

Glad to come across another Mahler fan on RHP.
Rattle with the Berlin Phil in the Resurrection is a classic. But check out Klaus Tennstedt with the LSO in Symphony No 8. This s an extraordinarily powerful reading of this mighty symphony of a thousand. Love Bernstein and Mahler - he always has such energy and passion! Disappointed in Dudamel's (the Dude!) reading of the 5th in this year's London Proms - lacked insight.

Originally posted by Pianoman1
Glad to come across another Mahler fan on RHP.
Rattle with the Berlin Phil in the Resurrection is a classic. But check out Klaus Tennstedt with the LSO in Symphony No 8. This s an extraordinarily powerful reading of this mighty symphony of a thousand. Love Bernstein and Mahler - he always has such energy and passion! Disappointed in Dudamel's (the Dude!) reading of the 5th in this year's London Proms - lacked insight.

Glad to come across another Mahler fan on RHP.
Rattle with the Berlin Phil in the Resurrection is a classic. But check out Klaus Tennstedt with the LSO in Symphony No 8. This s an extraordinarily powerful reading of this mighty symphony of a thousand. Love Bernstein and Mahler - he always has such energy and passion! Disappointed in Dudamel's (the Dude!) reading of the 5th in this year's London Proms - lacked insight.

I'd be glad to check out Tennstedt. But I always end up hearing the music compsed more than the performance. I do hear the performance but I am hopelessly on the side of the composition.

Thanks. Berlin Philharmonic is very good. Strauss's Alpine Symphony roars in Berlin.

It seems that the US or someone is trying to use Mr. Dudamel's conducting to interest a new generation of young people in classical. I hope it works. As a youngster Berstein's Young People's Concerts and Disney's Fantasia played a big part of that generation I think.

Which Mahler symphony is your favorite ? I think the 5th and the 6th are my two favorites.

Originally posted by Pianoman1
Glad to come across another Mahler fan on RHP.
Rattle with the Berlin Phil in the Resurrection is a classic. But check out Klaus Tennstedt with the LSO in Symphony No 8. This s an extraordinarily powerful reading of this mighty symphony of a thousand. Love Bernstein and Mahler - he always has such energy and passion! Disappointed in Dudamel's (the Dude!) reading of the 5th in this year's London Proms - lacked insight.

Hearing LSO now. Very good indeed !

YouTube

Originally posted by jaywill
[quote] Which Mahler symphony is your favorite? I think the 5th and 6th are my two favorites.

Wow, what a question!
Agree with you about 5 and 6, BUT how can you ignore 2 and 8?
I suppose, bearing ALL movements in mind I would have to say Symphony No 6 with Claudio Abaddo and Berlin Phil.

Originally posted by Pianoman1
Wow, what a question!
Agree with you about 5 and 6, BUT how can you ignore 2 and 8?
I suppose, bearing ALL movements in mind I would have to say Symphony No 6 with Claudio Abaddo and Berlin Phil.

It is difficult to ignore any of them. I compose myself and have learned much from studying Mahler scores.

I think it is safe to always choose the 5th as a favorite because that was his favorite.

I heard a live performance of the 6th in the 60s. I had excellent seats, which I do not always have in concerts. It was William Steinberg and the New York Phil.

Claudio Abbado's recording of the 7th I found to be very good. But like I said, I always end up focusing in on the composition more than the performance.

In the 8th, I think the LSO begins the YouTube at an excellent place. The ethereal celest thins things out with the high registered flute. (As Sibelius, I think, is good with low registered woodwinds, Mahler is really good with high registers in the woodwinds.)

And that LONG quiet resolution, each instrument falling from the dominant into the tonic, the flute I think falling into place last, to the dominant. Then the choral whispers into the tonic. Am I right? I am doing this from memory.

Oh, by the way, the gong on the LSO was more effective in the 8th.

Originally posted by jaywill
It is difficult to ignore any of them. I compose myself and have learned much from studying Mahler scores.

I think it is safe to always choose the 5th as a favorite because that was his favorite.

I heard a live performance of the 6th in the 60s. I had excellent seats, which I do not always have in concerts. It was William Steinberg and the New Y ...[text shortened]... doing this from memory.

Oh, by the way, the gong on the LSO was more effective in the 8th.

You sound knowledgeable about your musicology, jaywill, and so I'm sure you're aware that Mahler was brought up next to an army camp, which makes the brass fanfare intro to his 5th even more poignant.

Originally posted by Pianoman1
You sound knowledgeable about your musicology, jaywill, and so I'm sure you're aware that Mahler was brought up next to an army camp, which makes the brass fanfare intro to his 5th even more poignant.

I contradicted myself. The gradual resolution is to the dominant in the instruments. Then the choral resolves to a bearly audible tonic.

Sorry. No one yet caught the contradiction.

Now, concerning fanfares: One of the first things that attracted me to Mahler was the fanfare in the distance in the atmospheric opening of the First symphony. Off in the distance you hear this military fanfare. I saw it performed on TV with Liensdorf and the Boston Phil.

The trumpeters put on there mutes. I was really new to Mahler. Then I said, "Now that's pretty cool - a distant ghostly fanfare. What is this about? "

But the fanfare that really blew me away in Mahler was the powerpacked short fanfare of the 7th in the first movement. I hadn't heard anything so cool in the brass since Handel's Royal Fireworks Music.

Now the opening of the 5ths single trumpet call is also strangly followed by a funeral march there. It makes you wonder "Where was this composer's head ?"

One other notable fanfare I can remark on in Mahler. That is the fanfare in the opening movement of the 9th. It is like the distant heroic fanfare of the 1rst. But the BACKROUND is pitch black in mood !

What a contrast! It seems a fanfare of a great army defeated of a battle.

I'll try to collect these moments, of which you are probably familiar:

1.) 5th symphony opening trumpet fanfare - at 1.00 minutes

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2.) Atmospheric fanfare of the 1rst symphony - about 1.20 but the effect is best grasped from the start. (Lorin Mazaal - NY Phil)

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My once teenage son, upon hearing this cracked "These are the voygers of the Starship Interprise ...". Wise guy.

3.) The 7th symphony resonating and ringing fanfare (more trombone) Starting around 1:26


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4.) The 9th's fanfare reminicient of the 1rst's but to very dark backround. Start from about 10.20

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Of course the 2nd symphony contains so many brass fanfares. The off stage trumpets in the 5th mvmt. (to be payed as far away as possible), the extended horn fanfare of "The Great Summons", the "Epiphany" with, again off stage trumpets before the hushed enttry of the chorus in the remote key of Gb major, with that delicious Bb below the bass clef for the basses!(Mahler indicating that those basses unable to sing that low should remain silent rather than sing an octave up).
Much as I love the 2nd, the 6th has to be my favorite, with the first and last movements unusually being in sonata form, even with the traditional recapitulations in dominant, that ending! Those hammer blows of A minor, the Tragische is, in my view, music at its most powerful.

Originally posted by Pianoman1
Glad to come across another Mahler fan on RHP.
Rattle with the Berlin Phil in the Resurrection is a classic.

I'm certainly not a Mahler fan - can't really say why, but in a way he's always sounded a bit too random to me - but I must agree that Rattle handles the Berliner magnificently.

Richard

Originally posted by Shallow Blue
I'm certainly not a Mahler fan - can't really say why, but in a way he's always sounded a bit too random to me - but I must agree that Rattle handles the Berliner magnificently.

Richard

Mahler, like Wagner, is one of those love him / hate him composers. Because he commits himself so fully you are either with him or against him. I love the stormy passion, the adventurous modulations, the orchestration, the use of choral singing, the chromaticism and the vision of his music.

Originally posted by Pianoman1
Of course the 2nd symphony contains so many brass fanfares. The off stage trumpets in the 5th mvmt. (to be payed as far away as possible), the extended horn fanfare of "The Great Summons", the "Epiphany" with, again off stage trumpets before the hushed enttry of the chorus in the remote key of Gb major, with that delicious Bb below the bass clef for the ba ...[text shortened]... hammer blows of A minor, the Tragische is, in my view, music at its most powerful.

I don't know how I could overlook the fanfares in the 2nd. You are right.

Mahler's score notes were usually very precise and maticulous. I think being a top conductor gave him an extra insight. That 2nd symphony is held together quite well. I use to find the second movement kind of a black sheep.

You might say that the 6th Symphony is opposite in theme to the 2nd. Whereas the 2nd is the ultimate triumph of life the 6th is that final triumph of death.

What amazes me about the final is the heroic struggles upward that are really sinking lower. I mean you get a taste of a final push to victory only to sink by stages into a circus like march to the grave.

Such rustic beauty and nostalgic longing yet always in the shadow of a relentless funeral march beat. What a conception. What a combination. For Mahler to be devoted to such an idea over the course of the composition shows his skill. The creative mind is busing with activity daily. To stay committed to a conception takes discipline.

I would like you if you would to comment on similarities or differences you find in Mahler's 6th to Tchaikovsky's 6th. That would be interesting. I have some thoughts comparing the movements of the two.

The Hammer blows are quite memorable Pianoman1. What stricks me perhaps more is the ghostly like beauty fountain flourishes in the strings in the shadow of the funeral march beat and the shift from major to minor.

You know. Right here:

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There is also such a variety of themes in the 4th movement.

Much of the rest of the last movement sounds like a circus. I don't know why it is remenicient to be of big tent circus music. But I think Sibelius may have noticed this too. Maybe that was behind Sibelius competitive remark that he (Sibelius) had found his own voice and that there was nothing of "the circus" in it.

Anyway, probably one of the most effective slow movements in relation to the rest of the piece is the 3rd (Andante?). As you mentioned distant key, it is an oasis in a far distant key. In the midst of such a sardonic and frankly dark work, in the third movement you are removed to this little oasis of utter tranquility. This is quite striking in contrast in the liturature, I think.

I'm sure you are quite familar

YouTube


I'll stop here. Some others have posted something I want to read.