Here is a suggestion of a way to improve Mahler's Second Symphony, which as published is something of a dog's breakfast.
It has five movements (at least one too many for a symphony). So as a first step, the third (some sort of local pop-song, and very vulgar in tone) could be removed. The fourth should be removed as well, because it is a short and characterless song and entirely out of place in any symphony.
The question then remains of what to do with the grotesque current fifth movement (which goes on for a full thirty-six minutes!). The best approach is to cut it short just before the point (bar 418) where the off-stage brass instruments start up in earnest - what a silly and tastless gimmick that of the "distant horns" is!
There is no need for the chorus or solo voices either; in the current version the affair ceases to be a symphony just at the point where the chorus enters; after that it is mere rigmarole. So we are then left with a three movement work: the existing first, the existing second, and the best bits from the existing fifth. Like that it will be a much more satisfying, bearable, and manageable concert-hall experience will it not. We wonder whether some one has already done it like that.
And after writing the above, we just now consulted the critic Geoffrey Sharp, a most reliable judge, and we find he expressed almost exactly the same thought as we! "The solo and choral voices," says he, writing of this same work, "diffuse the clear outline and disrupt the homogeneity that a work must have in order to merit the term 'symphonic.'"
How encouraging it is to read his authoritative remarks: it shows that in our own suggestions we are definitely on the right track.
It has five movements (at least one too many for a symphony). So as a first step, the third (some sort of local pop-song, and very vulgar in tone) could be removed. The fourth should be removed as well, because it is a short and characterless song and entirely out of place in any symphony.
The question then remains of what to do with the grotesque current fifth movement (which goes on for a full thirty-six minutes!). The best approach is to cut it short just before the point (bar 418) where the off-stage brass instruments start up in earnest - what a silly and tastless gimmick that of the "distant horns" is!
There is no need for the chorus or solo voices either; in the current version the affair ceases to be a symphony just at the point where the chorus enters; after that it is mere rigmarole. So we are then left with a three movement work: the existing first, the existing second, and the best bits from the existing fifth. Like that it will be a much more satisfying, bearable, and manageable concert-hall experience will it not. We wonder whether some one has already done it like that.
And after writing the above, we just now consulted the critic Geoffrey Sharp, a most reliable judge, and we find he expressed almost exactly the same thought as we! "The solo and choral voices," says he, writing of this same work, "diffuse the clear outline and disrupt the homogeneity that a work must have in order to merit the term 'symphonic.'"
How encouraging it is to read his authoritative remarks: it shows that in our own suggestions we are definitely on the right track.
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