BaL 19.12.20 - Mahler Symphony no. 1

[Bryn]

How do you mean wrong Titan?

Jean Paul considered titling his novel "Anti-Titan". Mahler strongly discouraged any connection being drawn between the book and the First Symphony, once he had dispensed with the recycled Blumine and reorchestrated and otherwise adjusted the remaining four movements, thus making the First rather less 'titanic' than the Symphonic Poem in Two Parts.

[Pulcinella]

Hopefully our local pub tomorrow night - hopefully Lush or Bettys!
Well you did ask and OK - I didn’t choose the tiers!

Anyway it’s off topic - back to birdsong and Brother Jack and a work of Titanic proportions - a favourite of mine is BSO Ozawa with the Blumine included - yes I know its a marriage but it does fit quite well.

I used to have that version on LP.
Another bargain on Amazon: only £1196.57 (free delvery) for a new copy.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mahler-Symphony-No-1-Blumine/dp/B002A8ACHQ/ref=sr_1_10?dchild=1&keywords=mahler+ozawa&qid=1606984861&s=music&sr=1-10

It's also available considerably more cheaply as a Presto CD:

https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/8048790--mahler-symphony-no-1-in-d-major-titan

There are some s/h copies on Amazon too.
I'm a bit tempted, as I remember enjoying it, but I may just have been influenced by a dear friend who was a great BSO fan.

[Maclintick]

My tied-favourite (with no.3) GM symphony. I only have LSO/Solti, but don't feel the need for more recorded versions as live performances are (were ?) so frequent. I suspect Budapest FO/Fischer will be hard to beat, though...

[Leinster Lass]

Jean Paul considered titling his novel "Anti-Titan". Mahler strongly discouraged any connection being drawn between the book and the First Symphony, once he had dispensed with the recycled Blumine and reorchestrated and otherwise adjusted the remaining four movements, thus making the First rather less 'titanic' than the Symphonic Poem in Two Parts.

Hopefully not TOO off-topic, but does anybody happen to know when/by whom/on what authority Mahler's 6th symphony was first referred to as the 'Tragic'?

[Bryn]

Hopefully not TOO off-topic, but does anybody happen to know when/by whom/on what authority Mahler's 6th symphony was first referred to as the 'Tragic'?

It's problematic, for sure. Mahler rejected such titles for his symphonies but Bruno Walter asserted that the composer referred to the 6th as his tragic symphony and, as the Wikipedia entry has it, the programme for its Vienna premiere in 1907 used the soubriquet. It would seem that the tragic attribution derives from the character of the final movement.

[richardfinegold]

It's problematic, for sure. Mahler rejected such titles for his symphonies but Bruno Walter asserted that the composer referred to the 6th as his tragic symphony and, as the Wikipedia entry has it, the programme for its Vienna premiere in 1907 used the soubriquet. It would seem that the tragic attribution derives from the character of the final movement.

The last movement isn't exactly a ball of laughs, either...

[jayne lee wilson]

The 6th seems quint-essentially Tragic to me.

The 1st Movement ends in such an ecstatic blaze it could only be that escape, that transient narcotic release, believing its own fantasy for a few yearning seconds, that knows the darkness will soon return. Which it does in the scherzo, where the childlike voices are pursued by ghosts and nightmares, peter out into pathetic extinction. I always found the andante most heartbreaking of all, almost unbearable, as to me it says: "if only it could be like this....but it can't"....

Then the finale, one of the most extreme creations in all Art, about facing all those inner and outer fears: endurance, acceptance, exhaustion.

I identified so closely with it at one time, overwhelmed by every bar, I had to leave the hall at the beginning of the finale. I faced it, complete, one more time a few years later; something huge, something essential, was over. I don't expect ever to hear it again...

[Goon525]

How can we have been talking about the 6th for this long without anyone mentioning the order of the middle movements? Standards are slipping!

[Leinster Lass]

The last movement isn't exactly a ball of laughs, either...

Isn't the final movement the last movement?

[Bryn]

Isn't the final movement the last movement?

I was trying to sweep that under the carpet.

[Petrushka]

I was trying to sweep that under the carpet.

There are enough arguments over the movement order as it is!

[visualnickmos]

How can we have been talking about the 6th for this long without anyone mentioning the order of the middle movements? Standards are slipping!

Nothing to discuss; either slow, fast or fast, slow. Job done!

[jayne lee wilson]

How can we have been talking about the 6th for this long without anyone mentioning the order of the middle movements? Standards are slipping!

I feel my own preference was strongly implied....

[Bryn]

There are enough arguments over the movement order as it is!

Huh! What about whether or not to play the exposition repeat in the first movement? And as for the third hammer blow . . .

[Alison]

I’m not sure I’ve ever heard a bad performance of Mahler 1.