Today in Music (1904): Gustav Mahler Symphony No. 5 premiered.

Symphony No. 5 in C-sharp minor Gustav Mahler

Premiered: October 18, 1904 Composed: 1901-02 Peak: -- Sales (in millions): -- Genre: classical > symphony

Movements/Parts: Trauermarsch (Funeral march) Stürmisch bewegt, mit größter Vehemenz (Moving stormily, with the greatest vehemence) Scherzo. Kräftig, nicht zu schnell(Strong and not too fast) D major Adagietto. Sehr langsam (Very slow) F major Rondo-Finale. Allegro – Allegro giocoso. Frisch(Fresh) D major Average Duration: 75:00

Rating: 3.919 out of 5.00 (average of 3 ratings) Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Work: Gustav Mahler “emerged as a crucial bridge between the musical Romanticism of the 19th century and the modernism of the 20th, a composer who simultaneously summed up the achievements of his predecessors and pointed the way forward.” LP His fifth symphony was composed during the summers of 1901 and 1902, “during his annual holiday from his job as director of the Vienna Court Opera.” LP It was his first purely instrumental symphony since his first symphony. LP He composed it The symphony, “with its trajectory from mourning to triumph,” LP reflects Mahler’s relationship with Alma Schindler, “the beautiful daughter of a famous landscape painter.” LP He met her in Vienna the winter before he started writing the symphony and proposed to her in the fall of 1901. They were married and expecting their first child by the summer of 1902. WK The First Movement: The symphony “opens with a funeral march that starts with a trumpet fanfare whose rhythm dominates the movement. The march contrasts with two trio sections, the first bursting out of the near-silence like some sort of terrifying, demonic carnival music, the second a more somber, restrained passage for the strings.” LP The Second Movement: “The second movement builds on the material of that demonic first trio of the opening march. This is intense, raw music, with Mahler whipping up a frenzy from comparatively modest material. The only respite comes with the appearance of a D-major chorale, a joyous, hymn-like passage that finds the sun temporarily piercing the charged gray hues of the surrounding storm clouds.” LP The Third Movement: The third movement is the longest. “The mood abruptly shifts from the pessimism and storminess of the first two movements to a lighter, affirmative disposition, aided by the dance rhythms.” WK Mahler “balances the tone of folksy Austrian country dances and the more cultivated elegance of the Viennese waltz.” LP The “shadowy writing for the orchestra, has much in common with the ‘night music’ movements of Mahler’s Seventh Symphony.” LP The Fourth Movement: The fourth movement, “Adagietto,” was Mahler’s “declaration of love to Alma" LP and maybe Mahler’s greatest hit.” LP It “has often been performed as a stand-alone piece.” LP Leonard Bernstein conducted a performance of it on June 8 1968, at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Manhattan for the funeral Mass for Robert F. Kennedy. WK The Fifth Movement: “Several of the themes evolve out of the fragments heard in the opening measures. The last movement also utilizes themes from the Adagietto as well as the chorale from the second movement.” WK

Resources and Related Links: LP LAPhil.com “Symphony No. 5: Gustav Mahler” by John Mangum WK Wikipedia Other Related DMDB Pages: First posted 10/5/2023.

 

Today in Music (1895): Mahler’s Symphony No 2 premiered

Symphony No. 2 in C minor (Resurrection) Gustav Mahler

Composed: 1888-1894 First Performed: December 13, 1895 Peak: -- Sales (in millions): -- Genre: classical > symphony

Parts/Movements: Allegro maestoso Andante moderato In ruhig fließender Bewegung (With quietly flowing movement) “Urlicht” (Primal light) Im Tempo des Scherzos (In the tempo of the scherzo) Average Duration: 80 to 90 minutes

Rating: 3.909 out of 5.00 (average of 3 ratings) Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Work: Gustav Mahler’s second symphony, referred to as the Resurrection Symphony, was one of the composer’s “most popular and successful works during his lifetime. A 2016 poll from BBC Music Magazine named it the fifth greatest symphony of all time. It was his first major work that established his lifelong view of the beauty of afterlife and resurrection.” WK Mahler posed questions such as, “Why have you lived? Why have you suffered? Is it all some huge, awful joke? We have to answer these questions somehow if we are to go on living – indeed, even if we are only to go on dying!” LA He said these were questions posed in the first movement which would be answered in the finale. LA In 1888, Mahler began writing a symphonic poem called “Totenfeier (Funeral Rites)” which would become the first movement of the symphony. He said it represented the funeral of the hero from his first symphony, “whose death presented those superheated existential questions.” LA That same year, he started sketching out the second movement as well. He said it “sounds completely incongruous after the first” but that “it isn’t lack of understanding on the part of the audience…The Andante is composed as a sort of intermezzo (like an echo of long past days from the life of him whom we carried to the grave in the first movement.” LA It wasn’t until 1893, however, that he composed the second and third movements. WK The third movement is essentially a symphonic adaptation of “St. Anthony of Padua’s Sermon to the Fishes,” a song Mahler wrote based on a collection of German folk poetry called Des Knaben Wunderhorn (The Boy’s Magic Horn). LA He struggled with the finale because he knew it would be compared to Beethoven’s ninth symphony since both “use a chorus as the centerpiece of a final movement which begins with references to and is much longer than those preceding it.” WK The composition was completed in 1894 after Mahler received inspiration from the funeral of Hans von Bülow, a fellow conductor at the Hamburg Opera. Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock’s poem “Die Auferstehung (The Resurrection)” was performed and, as Mahler said, “It struck me like lightning…and everything was revealed to me clear and pain.” WK He incorporated the first two verses of the hym into his work. In March of 1895, Mahler conducted the first three movements with the Berlin Philharmonic. Then in December he led that orchestra in a premiere of the full work. LA

Resources and Related Links: DMDB encyclopedia entry for Gustav Mahler LA LAphil.com “Symphony No. 2, ‘Resurrection’” WK Wikipedia First posted 12/7/2023.

Today in Music (1889): Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 first performed

Symphony No. 1 in D major (Titan) Gustav Mahler (composer)

First Performed: Novembrer 20, 1889 Composed: 1884-1888 Peak: -- Sales (in millions): -- Genre: classical > symphony

Parts/Movements: Movement I: Langsam. Schleppend (Slowly. Dragging.) Movement II: Kräftig bewegt, doch nicht zu schnell (Moving vigorously, but not too fast.) Movement III: Feierlich und gemessen, ohne zu schleppen (Solemn and measured, without dragging) Movement IV: Stürmisch bewegt (Stormy) Average Duration: 53:20

Rating: 4.355 out of 5.00 (average of 5 ratings) Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About This Work: Gustav Mahler composed his first symphony based loosely on Jean Paul’s novel Titan. The four-volume work was published between 1800 and 1803 and tells “a convoluted tale…of a man who must discover his hidden past, find his ideal bride, and assume the throne of a small German principality.” US Mahler completed it in March of 1988 while working as the second conductor of the Stadttheater (City Theater) in Leipzig. While he started composing it in 1884, it appears he did most of the work in the six weeks leading up to its completion. Two months later, Mahler became the Artistic Director of the Royal Hungarian Opera, where he conducted the first performance of his symphony. US He referred to it not as a symphony but a “symphonic poem in two sections.” Originally the first section consisted of three movements, one which has since been removed, and a second section with two more movements. US Part I: From the Days of Youth,” Music of Flowers, Fruit and Thorn Spring and No End Flowerine Chapter (Andante) In Full Sail (Scherzo) Part II: Commedia umana (The Human Comedy) Stranded. A funeral march in the manner of Callot. D’all Inferno al’Paradiso (From Hell to Heaven). “These titles were accompanied by more extensive programs describing the metaphorical content of each movement. In Jean Paul’s Titan we have a youth gifted with a burning artistic desire that the world has no use for, and who, finding no outlet or ability to adapt, gives way to despair and suicide. Mahler apparently saw himself in this figure, as he described this work as autobiographical in a very loose sense. On the other hand the music, some of which Mahler actually accumulated from various earlier works, contradicts this program in so many ways, especially in the triumphant conclusion, that Mahler later withdrew it. He eventually came to scorn the application of specific programs to his symphonies in general.” SC He significantly revised the work before it was performed again in 1893. CR “The orchestra was expanded and the original second movement, entitled Blumine’ (Flowers) was dropped. This movement, the only surviving piece from Mahler’s incidental music to Scheffel’s Der Trompeter von Säkkingen, although having thematic ties to the rest of the symphony, is stylistically different, being scored for a much smaller orchestra.” SC Despite the changes and the fact that Mahler conducted multiple performances of the work, he never thought it received the acclaim it deserved. He would be pleased to know that more than a century later, there are more than 150 recordings available of his first symphony. CR “The primary source material for the remaining movements is…Lieder eines Fahrenden Gesellen (Songs of a Wayfarer). The material of these songs, specifically the first and second, is not only quoted but also used as thematic material in the symphony, creating additional programmatic implications. Mahler’s First Symphony is a stunning achievement for so young a composer, and despite its convoluted genesis is a fully mature, integrated and highly effective work.” SC Movement I: Langsam. Schleppend (Slowly. Dragging.) The movement “opens with an introduction invoking nature, eventually with cuckoo calls and distant fanfares. The principal theme is from the song Ging heut’ morgens übers Feld (I Went Out This Morning Through the Fields) and is developed in a standard sonata form.” SC Movement II: Kräftig bewegt, doch nicht zu schnell (Moving vigorously, but not too fast.) “The second movement, Kräftig bewegt (Strongly moving), is a lusty and hearty Austrian Ländler replete with yodels and foot stomping. The slower and wistful Trio conjures feelings of nostalgia and longing.” CS Movement III: Feierlich und gemessen, ohne zu schleppen (Solemn and measured, without dragging) “Based on a woodcut depicting animals carrying a hunter to his grave, the third-movement funeral march, Feierlich und gemessen (Solemnly and measured), is deeply ironic. Mahler uses the folk song "Frère Jacques" in a lugubrious minor, played by a muted double bass solo. The central Trio is an evocation of tawdry Viennese cabaret music.” SC Movement IV: Stürmisch bewegt (Stormy) “Mahler’s original program for the Stürmisch bewegt (Stormy) finale called the movement’s dramatic opening ‘the sudden outburst of a wounded heart.’ After a long and violent beginning invoking the torments of hell, including a vehement march derived from the first movement, the music subsides into a yearning theme. After a return to the march, Mahler interrupts the mood with a transformative fanfare that eventually leads to a triumphant conclusion.” SC

Resources and Related Links: DMDB encyclopedia entry for Gustav Mahler SC Steven Coburn, All Music Guide CR TheClassicReview.com (8/14/2020). “Mahler – Symphony No. 1 (Titan) – A Beginner’s Guide” by David A. McConnell US Utah Symphony (9/3/2014). “Mahler Listening Guide: Symphony No. 1 in D Major” First posted 7/2/2010; last updated 11/17/2023.