A Tale of Two Mahlers

[cloughie]

I love making the posts if they are relevant to what I'm thinking or reading at the time.

Part of the reason I posted about the Mahler 9th was that it was interesting there were two broadcasts of the work relatively close together,

On this side of the world, particularly in Canada, we rarely hear such great works live.
THANKFULLY, the internet has opened up a whole new world of listening possibilities.

On that topic, who would dream that one could listen to the Bayreuth Festival LIVE. This is now a summer tradition with me along with the Proms concerts.

Music, politics and art are VERY PASSIONATE with me, so more posts to follow

On a recent visit to Canada (British Columbia and Alberta and a wonerful experience), on visitng the odd record store - where they can be found - Seeking things I cannot get at home, I was disappointed to find no recordings by Canadian orchestras. Are any made nowadays?

[Flosshilde]

And quite right too ... and I also suspect you are perfectly capable of making up your own mind about a bit of gentle ribbing on this forum without the need for others (some not previously renowned for being particularly 'gentle') to do so on your behalf!

You looking at me Scotty? I'll have you know that 'Gentle' is my middle name.

[ahinton]

I attended a live 9th at the RLPO last December 5th with Petrenko. A piece I've been familiar with a long time, it seemed as though the evening would be about something I loved once and looked back upon, wishing somehow to recover that youthful intensity...
and then we reached the trio of the Rondo-Burleske - I was shaken, devastated by what was happening, from the core of me, from the gut! My heart was beating so fast by the start of the Adagio I was apprehensive about the emotional journey ahead...

It's when the music falls back to near-silence; those finale episodes reduced to a thread of sound, high violins, a solo bassoon, a slender bass line, that draw me in so close, too close, too the cold intensity at its heart, the certainty of death. Perhaps having been close to my own sense of mortality - in hospital, too few years ago - made it harder and more meaningful to listen to - but then, why did I respond so much in my teens? Many do respond without such experiences - they sense the truth of it.

Quite right about its place in history, at a stylistic, cultural and emotional crossroads. Mahler DID get through it, as the 10th shows. Now, THERE"S a subject for discussion...

As usual, excellent good sense here that gets right to the heart of the matter. It's long since struck me that the sense of valediction that imbues the finale (and there can perhaps be few valedictory testaments as powerful as this one) ultimately constitutes not the whole but a part of its emotional content, as what Mahler himself wrote of the tenth symphony demonstrates, as you say. Yes, there is an inevitable sense of resignation as the Ninth's finale progresses towards its disintegrative close, yet rather than the ultimate finality of death, its very last chord is almost a dominant to the opening of the Tenth!

As to that "crossroads" of which you write, it would indeed be a substantial subject for discussion. I'm just not quite sure about Mahler's own take on this - and the sheer prematurity of his death at the peak of his powers frustrates all but the most speculative thoughts as to where he would have gone from the Tenth, which arguably has more in common with its immediate symphonic predecessor than does anything else in his output. Mahler had already for some time been aware of something of a stylistic conflagration going on around him and it is a mark of his selflessness and generosity of spirit that he gave so much encouragement and support to the young Schönberg during the first decade of the last century, despite feeling rather at odds with where Schönberg was taking musical language at that time (although it's always been a matter of great perplexity to me how it was that Schönberg, who revered Mahler, found himself unable to come to terms with the elder composer's Ninth Symphony, as revealed in Style and Idea); Mahler's own language was developing, too, yet there is little sense of his peering over the abyss into atonality, for he was clearly well capable of continuing that development without sacrificing tonality or indeed his own individuality. But what a journey - stylistic and emotional - from the First Symphony to the Tenth! - an immense achievement over a mere 20-and-a-bit-year span, particularly since most of his composing activity had to be shoehorned into the spaces when he was not immersed in punishing conducting schedules.

[pmartel]

On a recent visit to Canada (British Columbia and Alberta and a wonerful experience), on visitng the odd record store - where they can be found - Seeking things I cannot get at home, I was disappointed to find no recordings by Canadian orchestras. Are any made nowadays?

CBC USED to be the big provider of classical recordings in this country, but as I've said in previous posts, CBC IS a shadow of it's former self.

We DO have some incredible talent in this country. My home city, Toronto, is home to Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, they record Sony. Another GREAT Toronto early music group, The Aradia Ensemble records for Naxos.

If there is anything you are looking for, chances are, they have a website and available that way, OR let me know by PM amd I could try to get it for you

[cloughie]

CBC USED to be the big provider of classical recordings in this country, but as I've said in previous posts, CBC IS a shadow of it's former self.

We DO have some incredible talent in this country. My home city, Toronto, is home to Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, they record Sony. Another GREAT Toronto early music group, The Aradia Ensemble records for Naxos.

If there is anything you are looking for, chances are, they have a website and available that way, OR let me know by PM amd I could try to get it for you

Thank you for your kind offer - not looking for anything specifically - just my curiousity as to what might be available.

[Bryn]

What about Tafelmusik?

[Sorry about the personalised address. That's just the way it came.]

[doversoul1]

and
Daniel Taylor and The Theatre of Early Music

http://www.theatreofearlymusic.com/temhome.html

[kernelbogey]

We hear from Tafelmusik quite a lot on TTN (Through the Night).

[kernelbogey]

Jayne, I've long been fascinated by the social and artistic upheaval that took place in pre-First World War Vienna and Mahler's 9th is a major part of it. It is astounding that both Hitler and Stalin were in Vienna at that time where the fate of the 20th century was being decided and into the world of the coffee-house and Sachertorte there came pieces like Schoenberg's 5 Orchestral Pieces and Mahler's 9th, the paintings of Egon Schiele and the literature of Arthur Schnitzler.

I've never managed to find a book that satisfactorily brings all these elements together to tell what is a fascinating story. Does anyone know of one?

Very interestingly, William Boyd has written a novel on just this period: Waiting for Sunrise, to be published in March. He writes about Vienna in this period in a fascinating article in today's Guardian Review:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/feb/03/william-boyd-viennese-waltz

He references no historical texts, but does refer to Robert Musil's The Man without Qualities and novels by Joseph Roth.

[Petrushka]

Very interestingly, William Boyd has written a novel on just this period: Waiting for Sunrise, to be published in March. He writes about Vienna in this period in a fascinating article in today's Guardian Review:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/feb/03/william-boyd-viennese-waltz

He references no historical texts, but does refer to Robert Musil's The Man without Qualities and novels by Joseph Roth.

Many thanks for pointing me in the direction of this article and book. I've been a William Boyd admirer since The Ice cream War and this latest looks a must-read for me.

I recognise his description of a visit to the Freud Museum on Berggasse as I had a not dissimilar experience when I went there. He is in error, though, in writing of Hitler being in Vienna in 1913; he wasn't. We know that Hitler left Vienna some time in 1912 to reappear in Munich in 1913 but about a year of his life is still shrouded in mystery - a stay with family in Liverpool has been mentioned as one possibility.

Boyd's article captures so well that world in which Mahler's 9th appeared. I don't usually attribute clairvoyance to a composer's work and I think we skate on thin ice if we look upon Mahler 6 or 9 as a sort of premonition of the First World War or the the ovens of Auschwitz but I do think that it is very much part and parcel of that extraordinary period of 1900-1914 Vienna.

[jayne lee wilson]

Petrushka - I can't find the book just now but IIRC, "Modern Times, Modern Places" by Peter Conrad, huge voluminous and authoritative tome, has a lot about just those subjects - Freud, Mahler, Schoenberg, Vienna - still on Amazon, definitely worth a look, if I dig mine out I'll come back with specifics.

[Petrushka]

Petrushka - I can't find the book just now but IIRC, "Modern Times, Modern Places" by Peter Conrad, huge voluminous and authoritative tome, has a lot about just those subjects - Freud, Mahler, Schoenberg, Vienna - still on Amazon, definitely worth a look, if I dig mine out I'll come back with specifics.

Thanks Jayne. At £1.02 for a used hardcover copy in good condition that looks a fantastic bargain.

I'm still very surprised, though, that I can't seem to find a book that deals very specifically with the social, political and cultural ferment that was Vienna in the first 14 years of the 20th century. It is a fascinating topic and the consequences resulting from it changed everyone's life, for good or ill, down to the present day. It's odd that the best I can find is a biography of the young Hitler, Hitler's Vienna by Brigitte Hamann.

Did you know that in all probability Hitler saw Mahler conduct Wagner's Tristan at the Vienna State Opera? It's impossible now to be sure about this, which seems to have been on May 8 1905, but if it is true then you can listen to Mahler 9 with a new perspective and it gives us one of the great ironies of history.

[kernelbogey]

[...] I don't usually attribute clairvoyance to a composer's work and I think we skate on thin ice if we look upon Mahler 6 or 9 as a sort of premonition of the First World War or the the ovens of Auschwitz but I do think that it is very much part and parcel of that extraordinary period of 1900-1914 Vienna.

I don't want to stretch too far my attribution of the premonitory to Mahler's music, but, at the risk of skating a little further into the centre of the frozen pond, I would point to the assertion in Hitler's Willing Executioners (Daniel Goldhagen) that anti-semitism was so deeply entrenched in Germanic culture that it was not obvious to the casual observer and therefore not documented. I imagine Mahler would have been very conscious of anti-semitism in Vienna - perhaps not unconnected with his conversion to Christianity. And (turning back for the shore now) compare our current situation. Many people have a strong sense just now of impending (financial) doom, and of things about to go completely out of control, yet this is not talked about openly. These are the subjects of high art, I'd humbly suggest.

[Petrushka]

I don't want to stretch too far my attribution of the premonitory to Mahler's music, but, at the risk of skating a little further into the centre of the frozen pond, I would point to the assertion in Hitler's Willing Executioners (Daniel Goldhagen) that anti-semitism was so deeply entrenched in Germanic culture that it was not obvious to the casual observer and therefore not documented. I imagine Mahler would have been very conscious of anti-semitism in Vienna - perhaps not unconnected with his conversion to Christianity. And (turning back for the shore now) compare our current situation. Many people have a strong sense just now of impending (financial) doom, and of things about to go completely out of control, yet this is not talked about openly. These are the subjects of high art, I'd humbly suggest.

I agree that there are insights granted to the artist that are denied the rest of us. Mahler would have been well aware of the ferment going on in Vienna at the time, anti-semitism included, but it is a big leap to say he predicted the Holocaust for which we, with the benefit of hindsight, can see developed over many decades, even centuries, to its logical end. It is an irony of horrendous proportions that that conclusion was being set into motion in the very same city at the very same time as Mahler was there. That is, I think, the furthest I would go.