Mahler 4 (i): is it 'about' anything ?

[Alison]

What are you thinking about when listening to the first movement of the Fourth ?

There's a striking out-of-doors feel to me. Beyond that I'm not sure. Are we in sunlight or shadow ?

Movements (ii) - (iv) have a more familiar narrative ......

[Chris Newman]

Hi Alison,
I'm not terribly original I'm afraid. I love the piece but rather boringly picture a horsedrawn sled.

[Beef Oven]

What are you thinking about when listening to the first movement of the Fourth ?

There's a striking out-of-doors feel to me. Beyond that I'm not sure. Are we in sunlight or shadow ?

Movements (ii) - (iv) have a more familiar narrative ......

Great observation - yes, we are outdoors, in the spring sun and moving into the shade from time to time, so as not to get uncomfortable.
.

[Petrushka]

What are you thinking about when listening to the first movement of the Fourth ?

There's a striking out-of-doors feel to me. Beyond that I'm not sure. Are we in sunlight or shadow ?

Movements (ii) - (iv) have a more familiar narrative ......

Believe it or not, Mahler 4 was the last of the canon that I came to truly love and the one I had least versions of until relatively recently.

Remember that the whole of the 4th came about because of that final song, Das himmlische leben, which was originally intended as the last movement of the 3rd Symphony. Everything therefore leads up to that song which has given birth to two entire symphonies!

The common thread linking the last three movements is clearly that of death, but death seen through the eyes of a child. I would contend that the first movement is as well. We are used to hearing this first movement as an easy-going piece but there are quotes from the last movement fanfares of the 'Resurrection' apocalypse as well as the opening trumpet fanfare of the 5th so I think we are looking at something a little bit more scary than farmyard noises. I prefer the 4th to be played with a bit more bite than we usually get and once it is you form a different perspective.

[MrGongGong]

What are you thinking about when listening to the first movement of the Fourth ?

There's a striking out-of-doors feel to me. Beyond that I'm not sure. Are we in sunlight or shadow ?

Movements (ii) - (iv) have a more familiar narrative ......

I think its about the way that air can be arranged into interesting patterns

[remdataram]

For me, if the 3rd is about nature, the world and love, the 4th 'feels' like it is about living in this creation.

I came to the 4th long after the 2nd, 3rd, 6th, 9th and 10th but it is now my favourite Mahler symphony. I love the Abbado/Luzern, the Szell and the Maazel recordings.

[cloughie]

What are you thinking about when listening to the first movement of the Fourth ?

There's a striking out-of-doors feel to me. Beyond that I'm not sure. Are we in sunlight or shadow ?

Movements (ii) - (iv) have a more familiar narrative ......

Does it have to be anything other than beautiful, moving music?

[jayne lee wilson]

Petrushka's is an exemplary description. It is a symphony about childhood, a song of innocence and experience. How can you listen to the first movement and not hear childish games, childlike wonder and fear, momentary clouds of unhappiness... but the day ends brightly!

Then in (ii) death appears as a ghostly, almost cartoonish figure - but don't worry for, like Stravinsky's Petrushka, it's only a toy...
In (iii) the true awareness of transience, mortality and grief. But there's still time for another game, and we end with a vision of paradise; the final song (iv) is a child's view of heaven.

"Happily ever after, but not quite..." All in the shadow of Death.

This was the first Mahler I fell in love with, and much of its unique sound and poetic effect comes from the death-haunted extremes of Mahler's own childhood. But what he created from those rawest of materials is a musical miracle.

[Panjandrum]

What are you thinking about when listening to the first movement of the Fourth ?

I'm usually thinking: "Christ, there's still another 55 minutes to go."

[Alison]

Does it have to be anything other than beautiful, moving music?

No it doesn't and I delight in listening (for example) to Shostakovich without much idea of the programme, agenda etc.

Nevertheless there are some good answers forthcoming that add to my knowledge and appreciation of this beautiful and
moving music.

[Alison]

I'm usually thinking: "Christ, there's still another 55 minutes to go."

Exactly . 55mins left of heaven.

[Panjandrum]

Exactly . 55mins left of heaven.

Touché.

[cloughie]

Exactly . 55mins left of heaven.

[John Skelton]

Jonathan Nott interviewed:

I look at: what have I got here. First of all – I’m looking down the wrong end of a telescope, because the song, the last movement, was written first of all. So then you start at the beginning as a performer and try to work out: how do you suggest how this story might actually be decomposed, back to its original roots. That’s the problem from telling the story – a story that you decide yourself. You have to have in there … it’s also, then, I look at the text of what I’m dealing with here, I’m dealing with actually quite a lot of blood and guts, and not really the kind of heaven I’d like to be in. And then I read all right the 3rd movement is … the child is lying dead in the church or Sankt Ursula is looking down from heaven. And I go, all right, fair enough – we start with some obviously intimate, peaceful music and then I get some terribly … struggling in a soul-searching music. And then the first music comes back again in a waltz or … and then back to the soul-searching and then it goes crazy. It goes completely mad at one point. But whose world is it that’s actually gone mad? It’s not the second world, it’s not the inner struggling human-being world. It’s some sort of world that’s going crazy.

How do I relate that to being something … And then you read what Mahler himself may have said about this, or what Alma may have said, or what some other commentator may have said. It seems to me the difficulties are really looking at what’s in front of you in black and white, and trying to sieve through all of these possible interpretations that somebody else seems to have put in, and finding your own way to be trying to be truthful to what the notes are there. But yet not, obviously, completely being able to ignore the fact. Then you find something that’s maybe fantastic – like, somebody says it’s like, you are walking through a forest and it’s a sunny day, then suddenly the sun goes behind a cloud, and you’re suddenly afraid, even though the sun is still shining. Then I can find something I can deal with, that fits in.

http://mahler.universaledition.com/jonathan-nott-on-mahler/

[Nick Armstrong]

I'm usually thinking: "Christ, there's still another 55 minutes to go."

Ray of sunshine, as ever Panny!

(Who's the cove in your new profile pic, btw?)