Order of movements in Mahler 6

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

How fundamental!

It's not called "analysis" for nothing.

[amateur51]

How fundamental!

That's clenched the argument!

[Alain Maréchal]

It's not called "analysis" for nothing.

The butt of many a joke.

Overgrown schoolboys all, former colleagues in the UK used to delight in giving titles to files which they knew would be truncated by the length of fields or mispelled, or abbreviated. "Analist" cropped up regularly, and you can imagine what fun was had with Sexually Transmitted Infection Forecast Funding in England. (tasteless, I agree, but my year's contractual imposition of silence is now ended and I feel liberated).

Apologies for including light relief - but I now wonder if that is what the 'missing' movement should have been, or if the scherzo should have been a jollier romp.

[aeolium]

That's very interesting about Ratz, ferney. I didn't know this about his background. But I certainly didn't intend to suggest that he wasn't sincere in his convictions about the order of movements in the 6th, which were surely as you suggest based on his careful study of the work. But it's clear from the Bruck essay (and the following one in the 'posthorn' link) that Ratz was desperate for any evidence to support the claim that Mahler eventually changed his mind again. All he had was the Mengelberg conducting score with the scribbled 1919 telegram from Alma to Mengelberg advising S-A as the correct order. So his primary witness for the prosecution was Alma, who at other times had suggested the order was the same as that at a performance conducted by Mahler at Amsterdam - there was no such performance - and in her memoirs gave the order as Andante-Scherzo. Had there been any such conversation between Mahler and Schönberg, would it not have come into the public domain at some point, particularly as it became such a controversial issue and performances continued to be given for many years after Mahler's death with the order Andante-Scherzo (not, apparently, by Webern and Mengelberg post-1919)?

All very suppository, of course, and in no way "admissable" evidence (at the very least, it would be hearsay) - but a good egg like Ratz' complete belief that the Scherzo - Andante was Mahler's latest view on the structure of the work has to have decent reasons behind it. Beyond that of the Musical superiority of that ordering, of course.

Though the evidence suggests that there weren't decent reasons, or if there were Ratz kept them so close to his chest that they have remained obscure. As to the 'musical superiority' of the S-A ordering, don't you think it's interesting that a scholar like Deryck Cooke, so steeped in Mahler's work, should have so emphatically supported the A-S order? Is it possible that Mahler intended to subvert that C19 tonal symphonic logic in his revision of the order of movements? There have after all been numerous instances in musical history where a composer has attracted critical venom by departing from the expected musical logic (what Keller called the "meaningful contradiction of expectation"). There are in any case a sufficient number of powerful musical figures supporting the A-S sequence, as well as - on the best evidence we have - Mahler himself.

[Alison]

I go with the musical superiority of S-A.

Not even close for me!

Lots of distinguished names can be lined up on both sides of the divide. To say that is A-S is right because Deryck Cooke thought so strikes me as one of the weaker arguments.

[ahinton]

Having followed this entire thread and read and contributed a response to the Classical Source piece (to which I note that David Matthews has also posted) and having spent some time yesterday studying the score once again, I think that I might - I only say might - have come up with the answer.

Mahler was, as we know, perfectly happy with the order of the middle movements of his Sixth Symphony while writing it and having completed it but began to experience pangs of doubt only when he put it into rehearsal for its première. It has been suggested that one factor that might have played a part in influencing him to change that order was his concern that this was his first work to begin and end in minor key darkness and that so much of the work exuded pessimistic, bitter and sardonic emotions - and that this prompted in him a need somehow to mollify the more extreme effects of all of this for his audiences; in the light of this, it might also have been the case that Mahler worried about the symphony's sheer complexity of utterance which was undoubtedly greater than in anything that he had previously composed. These were indeed factors that played upon his thoughts at that time, but not for the reasons above.

He realised, of course, that the symphony would play for almost an hour and a half and would begin and end grimly and tragically in an implacable A minor (the first of his symphonies to end in any minor key), so what occurred to him above all was that, given the likelihood that it would sow doubts and disturbances in the minds of most of its listeners for some time to come and, as a consequence, risk being cast aside as his least successful symphony and forgotten, he must do something to ensure its future.

He pondered for a while and then thought "ah! - I know - I'll wait until the score's published and then immediately announce my wish to change the order of the middle movements - this will cause controversy! - and then, because the music so obviously suggests that the order of those movements should never have been changed, people will talk about it for years, conductors and scholars will argue incessantly over it and its place in the repertoire will accordingly be assured!". He then patted himself on the back for adding successful strategist and manipulator to his gifts as the composer of songs and symphonies and his conducting prowess and, with renewed vigour and confidence, decided that he could even conduct Rachmaninov playing a new piano concerto should the opportunity ever arise (which, of course, it did a couple of years later).

Fhg referred upthread to Strauss and Schönberg as being among Mahler's most distinguished confidants at this time and it is therefore no surprise that Mahler revealed that secret to each of them but, since he wanted it to remain a secret, he did so only in conversations rather than by letter.

Now of course someone else here might be able to disprove this and/or come up with a better and more convincing solution, but unless FF considers this to be wholly inappropriate for a forum as serious as this one, I think that it should stand at least for the time being. In the meantime, the sheer impact of the symphony is such that one unique aspect of it has even spawned something of a sub-tradition in such works as If I Had a Hammer, Le Marteau sans Maître and all the scores that mid-20th century English composers wrote for Hammer films, not to mention the Russian composer who he most heavily influenced, Shostakovich, with all his symphonic hammers and sickles...

[ahinton]

That's clenched the argument!

Buttock orse it has!

[ahinton]

That's very interesting about Ratz, ferney. I didn't know this about his background. But I certainly didn't intend to suggest that he wasn't sincere in his convictions about the order of movements in the 6th, which were surely as you suggest based on his careful study of the work. But it's clear from the Bruck essay (and the following one in the 'posthorn' link) that Ratz was desperate for any evidence to support the claim that Mahler eventually changed his mind again. All he had was the Mengelberg conducting score with the scribbled 1919 telegram from Alma to Mengelberg advising S-A as the correct order. So his primary witness for the prosecution was Alma, who at other times had suggested the order was the same as that at a performance conducted by Mahler at Amsterdam - there was no such performance - and in her memoirs gave the order as Andante-Scherzo. Had there been any such conversation between Mahler and Schönberg, would it not have come into the public domain at some point, particularly as it became such a controversial issue and performances continued to be given for many years after Mahler's death with the order Andante-Scherzo (not, apparently, by Webern and Mengelberg post-1919)?

Such a conversation might or might not have entered the public domain in some way but, since Schönberg was not only "no mean conductor" as fhg points out but a truly astonishing one (Sorabji heard him at least twice and considered that, had he prioritsed this aspect of his career, he'd have given even such luminaries as Toscanini a run for their money), the clinching evidence would have been had he included it regularly in his repertoire using the S-A order but, to the best of my knowledge, he didn't even conduct it once.

[aeolium]

To say that is A-S is right because Deryck Cooke thought so strikes me as one of the weaker arguments.

OK - how about: because Mahler thought so?

ahinton's msg 77 is a nice story. All it lacks is evidence to support it. It is not a matter of needing evidence to disprove speculation that Mahler changed his mind again; it is a matter of needing evidence to prove that he did.

[ahinton]

OK - how about: because Mahler thought so?

ahinton's msg 77 is a nice story. All it lacks is evidence to support it. It is not a matter of needing evidence to disprove speculation that Mahler changed his mind again; it is a matter of needing evidence to prove that he did.

If it's to be assessed purely on evidential grounds, yes, but even to do this need not necessarily obviate admission of the question as to whether, evidence or no evidence, Mahler might in any case have made a wrong decision...

[aeolium]

If it's to be assessed purely on evidential grounds, yes, but even to do this need not necessarily obviate admission of the question as to whether, evidence or no evidence, Mahler might in any case have made a wrong decision...

Then, on that basis, we can revisit all of those other cases of composers' second (and last) thoughts where they seem to have made "wrong decisions".

As I am now in danger of repeating myself on this thread (if I haven't already several times) I shall bow out of it with this my last comment on the matter. I am glad that the Critical Edition has been amended to restore the order that as far as we know Mahler finally sanctioned; that Peters has reprinted scores with that order; and that a number of conductors have changed their minds and performed it with that order as a result of the recent research. No doubt there will continue to be debate about it, and there will be performances of both versions (and listeners can arrange recordings to suit their own preferences).

And now the field is free for those who feel that Mahler made the wrong decision, that he must have changed his mind again , or that he would have seen the light eventually

[Roehre]

..... All he had was the Mengelberg conducting score with the scribbled 1919 telegram from Alma to Mengelberg advising S-A as the correct order. So his primary witness for the prosecution was Alma, who at other times had suggested the order was the same as that at a performance conducted by Mahler at Amsterdam - there was no such performance - and in her memoirs gave the order as Andante-Scherzo. Had there been any such conversation between Mahler and Schönberg, would it not have come into the public domain at some point, particularly as it became such a controversial issue and performances continued to be given for many years after Mahler's death with the order Andante-Scherzo (not, apparently, by Webern and Mengelberg post-1919)?....

I should have checked this earlier, but there we are.
Wondering why there isn't AFAIK any mentioning by Schönberg (who attended AFAIK the whole of the festival, together with Alma btw) of any peculiarities regarding the performance of Mahler 6 by Mengelberg during the 1920 Amsterdam Mahler Feest (Friday May 14th 1920, 7.30pm -a rather weird programme: the symphony before, the Kindertotenlieder following the interval ): there wasn't anything to be surprised about.
Mengelberg played S-A, in the presence of Alma.

[Roehre]

.....
Mahler was, as we know, perfectly happy with the order of the middle movements of his Sixth Symphony while writing it and having completed it but began to experience pangs of doubt only when he put it into rehearsal for its première. It has been suggested that one factor that might have played a part in influencing him to change that order was his concern that this was his first work to begin and end in minor key darkness and that so much of the work exuded pessimistic, bitter and sardonic emotions - and that this prompted in him a need somehow to mollify the more extreme effects of all of this for his audiences; in the light of this, it might also have been the case that Mahler worried about the symphony's sheer complexity of utterance which was undoubtedly greater than in anything that he had previously composed. These were indeed factors that played upon his thoughts at that time, but not for the reasons above........

ahinton, I'd like to make to remarks here:
First, there were doubts whether this should be a four or a five movement symphony. A second scherzo (c-minor) was originally planned between the Andante and the finale. IMO Mahler's thoughts about the order of the middle mvts could be related to this original concept of the work.

Secondly, this is the very first work Mahler composed which was begun and ended in the "new" style - the fifth symphony's scherzo really started in "wunderhorn-"style and the fifth's original orchestration was a kind of off-shoot of the fourth. It is not by chance Mahler was struggling with Symphony 5's orchestration.
He was acutely aware of the "new" complexities which the Sixth provided, not only for the composer, but certainly also for the public. It is also the first symphony for which Mahler started sketches on systems of 4 staves, not only dotting down melodic fragments, but also possible counterpoint. This was new to Mahler, who upto then used to dot down ideas on not more than two stave systems (and the return during sketching 10 to the until the sixth usual way of sketching on one of two staves, is witness of the urge to get 10 put on paper).

I do think Mahler's all this may have contributed to his doubts re the middle mvts' order.

[ahinton]

ahinton's msg 77 is a nice story. All it lacks is evidence to support it.

Why of course! But what it doesn't lack is a cheek and a tongue to put into it!

It is not a matter of needing evidence to disprove speculation that Mahler changed his mind again; it is a matter of needing evidence to prove that he did.

For all that my money's on S-A, I do not seriously believe that Mahler ever changed his mind on this a second time but, if by chance he did, he almost certainly confided in no one over it; the very fact that his publishers would have been tearing out their hair even more vigorously at his vacillations might well have seemed as good a reason as any for him to remain silent on any such second change of mind even if he'd actually had one.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

don't you think it's interesting that a scholar like Deryck Cooke, so steeped in Mahler's work, should have so emphatically supported the A-S order?

I don't think that the author of The Bruckner Problem Simplified should be called to give evidence against someone accused of manipulating facts in order to give the public a false impression of a composer's intentions!

I'm still trying to summarize Fux (via Palestrina) - Sechter - Marx - Riemann (via Rameau) - Schenker - Schönberg and their summaries of the metaphysical ways in which Tonal relationships expressed a philosophical view of the cosmos which gave "meaning" to "contradictions of expectation". It ain't easy, not least because the Boards not only don't allow Music script, but they won't accommodate a circle diagram. I'll keep trying; essentially, however, it's a very different thing from the use of Tonality in, say, the works of Russian composers - there'd not be an equivalent problem if the middle movements of Rachmaninoff's Second Symphony were reversed, for example. It looks as though Gantz, who found that some of the Tonal relationships in the original published version "made little sense", hadn't grasped 19th Century ideas ... no, "ideals" - it's practically a religious faith - of what Tonality was for the Austro-German Symphonic composers.

And, I think that there is a chasm here between Music Analysts (who use the evidence of the Music) and "Scholars" (who read letters and diaries) which will always mean that a satisfactory agreement is unlikely: they/we shall always believe that they/we are in the right and the other side are fundamentally muddled. The work will remain, and on the CD programmer, it's ours to listen as best suits our personalities - even on "Shuffle"!