Gustav Mahler

* Symphony nr.3

Christa Ludwig (Alt), Philip Smith (Posthorn), Joseph Alessi (Trombone),
Glenn Dicterow (Violin), New York Choral Artists, Brooklyn Boys Chorus, New
York Philarmonic Orchestra/Leonard Bernstein
DGG 427328-2 [2 CD's]

Summary for the busy Executive:  Mahler Love

By and then arises the question what the very inner nucleus of a composer
and his music is.  It symptomizes in the question "Which of Mozarts
Pianokoncerts is the most Mozartean?" or "Which Wagner opera is the most
Wagenrian?" and of course; "Which of Mahler symphonies is the typical
'Platonian Ur-Idee' Mahler?".  For Mahler - and for many other composer -
this is very difficult to say.  For Mahler, shall one choose a Wunderhorn
symphony (1-4)? Or any of the newer idiom Mahler (6,7,9)? Or the bridge
between those, the 5th? And what role does "Das Lied von der Erde" take?
The 4th symphony is a hot candidate, it is opften said as it is a
Wunderhorn symphony, but still pointing forward to the 5th.  But the 4th
is more quirky than it can seem at first sight, and I would rather think
of the symphony Mahler composed during the sumemrs of 1895/96 - the 3rd
symphony.  Like the 4th, this symphony has characteristica that differs
from the other Mahler symphonies, as all the other Mahler symphonies has
to each other.  The size of teh 3rd is indeed gigantic, with its format
as great as, or even precceeding, Bruckners 8th symphony.  Thereto it has
fully six movements, what cannot be found anywhere else in Mahler, although
he now used 5 movements in his 2.  and 7.  symphonies.  But other things
speaks for it.  It has a Wunderhorn song in it, as well as much tematic
material therefrom, and somehow the Wunderhorn songs are so much Mahler,
so always should something essential be missing if they were left out.
It shares also Wunderhorn themes, with the 4th symphony, and
therewith is a link of the chain of symphonies by Mahler.  Still, this
symphony also points forward to what is yet to come, and as an outer sign,
it has melodic material in common with "Das Lied von der Erde", just
listen to the motto!  ...But the third symphony has something in itself
that is not so clearly written out in the rest of Mahlers production; his
'Weltanschauung' elaborated.  It was Satoshi Akimas thougful writing on the
Dionysian spirit of Wagner (as clearly expressed in "Tristan und Isolde"),
and the influence from Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, that made me see Mahlers
relation to this.  I don't think it is a random that Mahler used
"Zarathustras Mitternachtlied" in the same symphony and preceeding the
Wunderhorn song "Es sungen deri Engel...".  For Wagner the Will to power
was overgoing in a sort of resignation according to Schopenhauer, meanwhile
he stood under influence from Nietzsche, and Wagner finds relief in 'the
good act' as a development from Schopenhauer.  Although "Parsifal" might
seem quirky, for neither Wagner nor Nietzsche self-knowledge did turn back
to religion, but for Mahler it did, and that is what he speaks of in his
3rd symphony.  Something that isn't so clearly said even in the 8th
symphony, which has more of the older Mahlers thoughts, not the same
raving for spirital reassurance Mahler had at the time for the 3rd.  Still,
similarities not to forget, as Mahler in the 8th looks back on his earlier
thoughts.

When Mahler said about his 8th symphony, in the famous saying about setting
universe in motion, that a symphony should be as life, including a whole
world, he was just quoting himself to what he said about teh 3rd symphony
in a letter to his friend Siegfried Lipiner; "...to me 'symphony'means
constructing a world with all the technical means to ones disposal".  This
however didn't mean just the use of formal and textual devices and the
conductors virtuoso command of a huge orchestra, but also whole set of
stylistic allusion in all registers; from the grand to the grotesque, from
the sentimental to the sublime....Mahler wasn't the only creator of the
symphony; his friend Siegfried Lipiner had much influence on him, and it
could be said that they two worked out the symphony together although
Mahler made all the technical work in the formal act of setting the music.
But they both loved the symphony as its of, although it is a matter of
different approaches.  But the main idea of the journey from Schopenhauer
through Cristianity to redemption was a wiew they shared.  Or differently
said, the world is presented in the first movement with its struggle of two
forces in D minor and F major, and the following five movements a discovery
journey through the world in an order ascending from the flowers of the
field and the beasts of the forest, through men and angles, to the love of
God.

Mahler revised the first movement of the symphony.  It had originally been
concieved as an introduction to the rest, the journey of exploration; the
joyful entrance of summer in all its manifold bounty.  But the traversal of
the journey through the last five movements had meanwhile compelled Mahler
to reinterpret and rewrite the first.  The image of Dionysos with his
drunken rout gave way to the more profound one of Pan, who stands for the
whole of Nature - a Nature that first must be slowly and painfully awakened
from its winter sleep, before summer could make its triumphant entry.  The
movements had originally names attached to them; 1 "Summer Marches in", 2
"What the Meadow Flowers tell me", 3 "What the Creatures of the Forest Tell
Me", 4 "What Night Tells Me", 5 "What the Morning Bells Tell Me", 6 "What
God Tells Me".  Still, and Mahler himself stressed that, the symphony may
not to be interpreted as programmatic music.  The names only form the outer
frame, the movements must be understood as symbols instead.  That is really
vital to an understanding of the symphony.  Symbols, like in Wagner, and so
utterly unlike Debussy.  As Jeremy Noble so fittingly put it:  "Mahlers
Nature always casts a metaphysical shadow".

With that the music starts, Nature is awakening, slowly and painfully from
its winter sleep.  First comes a motto from the horns, which is rounded off
by the low brass, a figure that will return later in the symphony under
different circumstances, togheter with the solemn hymn played by the horns
that follows them.  A funeral march continues the journey, and ankward
melodical fragments are presented, mainly in the horns.  These melodical
fragments is the composers material, and will gain different meaning and
expression later on in the work, but here they just represent the protests
of beasty forces set in awakening against their will.  Earth is moaning and
groaning in high flutes and tremolo strings melody, which is taken over by
the oboe and solo violin.  The passage lands in a flat key (Db) that is
tonal impasse, and the first awakening fades away.  The funeral march
starts over again, and this time a trombone answers to it with a vast range
of emotions.  When the high instruments come in again, it leads to F major,
which is the "right" key, and with that comes the summer.  The funeral
march transformes to a more bouncing melody.  But victory is not so easily
won; the funeral march starts up again, and takes us back to the wrong key
(D minor) of the opening, with its seemingly chaotic presentation of
thematical fragments.  Then the violin reaches through the keys, ending on
the old enemy Db again in climax, and the music crashes into mere rythm,
and therefrom the recapitulation starts, with the horn motto, the response
to it, the funeral march, the trombone solo...but this time F major is more
quickly reached.  More and more instruments join the throng, and summers
triumphatory outburst, this gigantic movement of 875 bars ends in its right
key.

The second movement is labelled "Tempo di Menuetto" and shines mainly
because of its masterful orchetration.  "If the flowers have been shaken
by rough winds, they are now sweetly shone upon by the summers sun", as
Mahler himself writes so poetically.  With its soft and secure form it
stands as a nice relief to the tensions of the first movement.  Still it
stands mainly as a place where the interpreter might take a rest between
the other more important parts of the symphony.  The next movement,
however, the one named "What the Beasts of the Forrest tells me", is far
more complex both in form and expression.  Its primordial material is a wry
little rythm from "Des Knaben Wunderhorn" which tells that the cuckoo is
dead, and the nightingale can sing whole night long.  The first 1/5 of the
movement consists of the original song, where its rather sinister subtext
is then being worked out.  The beasts have a rather fun time for a while,
represented by a bouncing polka rythm, with a melody that at once recalls
Mahlers Bohemian homeland.  The polka is abrupted by a soli posthorn and a
halo in high strings, before it returns, and grows with greater and greater
vehemence.  A last echo from the posthorn is heard before there comes a
crescendo from pianossimo to fortissimo in just a few bars with the
woodwinds screaming out their "Cuckoo is dead!"-signal.  The returnth of
the polka in a joyless session ends the movement.  Mahler once spoke of
this movement as the animals alarm in the precsence of man, but he also
spoke about "such a gruesome Panic humour in this movement that one is
likely to be overcome by horror than by laughter".  However after this
horrifying music the listener is being awaked from his nightmare and
comforted in a slowly profound serious movement that is the turning point
of the whole symphony.

In this case Mahler choosed not another Wunderhorn song, but Nietzsches
famous midnight song from "Also sprach Zoroaster", and that was by no means
by chance.  It was originally named "What Man tells me", but while working
out his concept Mahler changed it to "What Night tells me".  Darkness, as
in "Tristan und Isolde", brings revelations more profound than those of
day; that joy lies deeper than sorrow; that desire for eternity lies deeper
as the longing for death.  But Mahler inserts yet another aspect to this
when he quotes the opening of the first movement to the words "O, Mensch!",
and the human voice replies, not only as the alto voice, but in violins and
horns (again!), with the same anguish reluctance as did the inanimate world
to spring.  This is naturally followed by "What Angels tell me" with its
folklike melody and poem from "Des Knaben Wunderhorn".  It brings a message
of both receptance as well as forgiveness:  "So you have broken the ten
commandments? - Then fall on your knees and pray to God".  But it is the
following line; "Love God alone whole your life", which gives the cue, both
psychologically and musically for the final stage of Mahlers cosmological
ascent.

So, the childrenchoir and altsolo represent the Divine element in Mahlers
"Weltanschauung".  But it is important to realize that it is about love -
love through God.  Love can, however, be many things.  The classic Greek
language has three words for love; "Eros", from which the word "erotics" is
derived, and means the [sexual] love between man and woman (or man and man
or woman and woman), like for Wagner the love to Judith Gauthier.  There is
also "Etos", from which the word "ethics" is derived, and means an abstract
love, such as love to the fatherland for example, like for Wagner, the love
to Germany.  And there is "Agapai", which is the unselfish love, like for
Wagner the mutual love to (the Jew!) Joseph Rubinstein for example.  Mahler
clearly manifests what he means with to references to other works:  A
melodical similarity in "DaB Petrus sei von Suenden frei" to that of
that controversial passage of the elfdaughters anger in Niels W.  Gades
"Elverskud", a work which was popular in Europe at this time and Mahler
might have heard or even conducted, and followed by (and Mahler wasn't
the one who denied the influence and importance of the old masters!) a
similarity to a lyric passage sung by Orfeus in Monteverdis "L'Orfeo".

At first Mahler had placed "What love tells me" ast the slow movement
position, but later he felt instead that this would be the prefect material
to tie together all the symphonies ribbons, although it would make an
extremely unorthodox place for an adagio, despite Tjajkovskijs 6th, which
was premiered three years before.  Unorthodox it might be, but by no means
arbitrary.  Psychologically it seems not just right but inevitable, because
the thriumph which the whole development has been working to, is not an
outher one of action, but an inner one of contamplation.  It has been a
long journey, wandering through many different keys, and at last the third
symphony finds relief in a peaceful D major.  It also ties together all
thematical material that have not been, or have been insufficuiantly worked
out, with the complete sessions, for example the violins responce to the
night song, finds relief here, and the yearning outcry in the end of the
first movement is here rounded off in peace by a genial transformation of
the opening hornmotto, which somehow suggests the cyclic progress of life
and nature.  It is indeed a "Whole World", not just with the timespan and
gigantic forms, but with all the subtle music interrelations between its
different themes and parts, and the constant intensity of its creators
vision.

Nobody who has heard Bernstein conduct Mahler, can doubt that Mahlers music
meant something very special for Bernstein, and that he had a very special
relation to this music.  There is an nowadays old saying that goes that
"Bernsteins Mahler is more Bernstein than Mahler".  It is a schablon of
course, but still there lies truth in it.  Bernstein loved this music
deeply, and that is his advantage to other interpreters when at his best,
but it is also the problem with Bernstein.  He apparently identified
himself so much with this music that he to times thought it was his
own property.  One could say that if every bar is thought through in
Furtwaenglers interpretations of Wagner, then every bar is emotionally
lived through in Bernsteins Mahler.  Thanks to this special affinity for
Mahler, Bernstein tend to overdo the recordings to times.  His Mahler 1
with Het Concertgebouworkest is, although some tempos far to the slower
side, spelndid, had it not been for a distinct increace of tempo in the
very end.  Obviously Bernstein couldn't hold back anymore, and seemed to
think that high tempo automatically means more power, what not is the case.
This recording, was taken up in Sofiensaal in Wien in a live performance in
November 1987, because of this halls remarkable acoustics - it is one of
worlds finest concerthall from that aspect, and is one of the more "safe"
Bernstein Mahler recordings.

Bernstein throw us directly into action, without imposing a too brutal
hornmotto.  The horn has a soft sound when played loveable, and a brittle
sound when played aggressively.  But they can be played on "between" the
hard and soft accentuations, and the result is a sound that is both soft
and brittle, and that makes a perfect intro to the symphony.  A too brutal
start wouldn't make the listener sence the slow awakening of the Nature,
it would just sound painful, in the very utter meaning of the word.  If
this is to credit the conductor for or the hornplayers could be argued
about.  This is just a description about the introduction, but it is
telling as it goes for most part of the whole performance.  It is a very
emotiative Mahler, which is droven to is expressive limit without these
limits passed over, although the vehemence setting in the beginning.
After the hymn which passes on dragging itself down to a very slow tempo,
with a piano pianissimo so quiet that only Celibidache could have allowed
himself to something similar.  Then the ice slowly melts with the tempo and
dynamics slowly increasing in value.  Bernstein let Nature protest with
sharp screams from the trumpets, but the underlying basses continue their
growing march undisturbed.  Glenn Dicterow plays his violin solo with a
tender tone and it melts together with the high woodwinds squeaking
figures.  The dark instruments funeral march starts over again, and Joseph
Alessi shows a good trombonists ability to express the various emotions
that his notes can be transformed to.  There is anger, anguish, fear,
resignation, impression, strong proudness....The first glimpse of summer
make the orchestra change, in a change as sudden as a change in the
weather, to a completely different sound.  The New York Philarmonics
playing now sounds beautifully transparent.  Bernstein builds up a quick
crescendo smoothly and thereafter the summer winds gets more weight.  But
what is Mahler without the ubiquitous shifts of mood, and Bernstein allows
the funeral march come back with a serious and dark colour.  The violin
which is heard again reaches an illusory mood when it enters the G major
key, and that little finesse gives a very interesting perspective.  The
trumpets playing in the development drew my notice because of it liveleness
and bouncy feeling in the rythms, really "in kaeck Ausdruck".  Again, when
the recapitulation starts, mainly the horns spit out small thematical
fragments that gives a very chaotic impression as the horns dump off their
signals as it was something they hasten to get rid of.  The trombone shines
again in the recapitulation, and the whole part is similary played to its
original, just with a little lesser heavy sound, as it this time Bernstein
was sure his forces of sunshine should come to victory.  And they do!  And
what a victory!  The playing when the summer finally enters is swallowing
over with the most divine joy.  Bernstein not only conducted Mahler, he saw
Mahlers music as a room where he could release his own emotions freely,
even living out his own neuroses, using the conducting as therapy.  And
is not Mahlers summer at this place in the third symphony, Bernsteins own
summer.  Perhaps in this way he should overcome his own frost injurys of a
hard childhood.  According to how it sounds he sought to find redemption in
this his favourite music, which was his religion.  This ending part of the
first movement is to me the finest in the whole performance.

The menuetto is the relaxing point in the symphony, but Bernstein is not
relaxing here, and he looks for that his orchestra isn't relaxing either.
It is now so that a relaxingpoint in a symphony is also important to
play well of course, as it may fill its function properly.  Nothing very
important for the symphonys preceeding per se is happening in this part,
but it is a very carefully orchestrated part still, and Bernstein might
have used a pretty good ammount of working with the orchestra before the
performance to get the right balance.  Something is however happening, and
the most frappant is the development over meter, which in all movements of
the symphony starts in even C meter, to take the most various states, like
5/4 here, or even 11/4 in movement three.  The movement is sweetly and
gently taken, in an almost Schubertian shape.  Part three so takes over
with its thrills in bird songs, and nature sounds, and is really played
"scherzano", with a sudden tempoincreasing.  Very convincing is the falling
figure in the low brass, followed by a soundcanvas quietly played strings
and woodwinds, which all in all gives a very Wagnerian soundimage, where
the tempo is back in the original.  "Art can not create life", as another
Leonard; Leonardo da Vinci said, "but its task is to create an image of
life", and that is a good description of what happened here.  Then the
tempo goes down in the middle section and the music proceeds completely
without stress, without getting too slow.  Again, Bernstein puts the music
right to the "ultimative" line, without stepping over.  The fanfareinto is
taken perfectly by the trumpeters, although it goes in a very quick tempo,
the flutepassages between are played so relaxed so it sounds as half the
tempo precisely.  The polka bounces on like if the beasts of the forrest
were some really joyous creatures.  The posthorn (Philip Smith) plays the
most beautiful solo.  A horn is difficult to play in the high registers as
the naturetones lies very close to each other, but Smith can do this in the
sleep.  A wonderful timbre has his playing, meanwhile carefully integrated
with the rest of the inputs from other instruments.  The crescendo is by no
means overdone, and doesn't exceed fortissimo, what again is a very wise
tactics, as a to strong crescendo wouldn't do very fittingly to the calm
music that foretook it.  The polka returns in a very aggressive expression
which ends the movement in a feeling of discomfort.

The basses that preceed Nietzsches text are supposed to give the mood
to what shall follow.  It is dark and mysterious.  Bernstein chooses a
very slow tempo, but the French and English horns can play it very well,
very dynamic, and Christa Ludwig sings with careful intertwine with the
orchestra and the greatest compassion piano pianissimo throughout.  After
a while the violin takes part in the accompaignation, and Glenn Dicterow
playes with a very passionate touch.  What a great instrument the violin
is to express emotions!  Had you not realized it before, this passage is
to convince you.  For the last half of the fourth movement it is written
"Somehwat quicker Tempo - Subito!", but I can't sence that Bernstein
increase the tempo.  The result is though very good.  Then suddenly, as
from nowhere the children choir starts singing, when we enters the fifth
movement.  If something is not perfect in this performance it is the choir,
which sounds smooth and unclear, and not with the very right diction.  But
the playing downunder the singing is the more impressing.  The crescendo
in the brass and low strings is of incredible beauty.  The altsolo is
very well taken, although this type of singing is very different from the
"Mitternachtslied" in the previous movement.  Christa Ludwig is skilled!
Her voice also don't sound young, but it is also a mistake to belive that
the singer needs to sound childlike just because the songs that the music
consists of is called "Des Knaben Wunderhorn".  As H.C.Andersen said:  "My
Adventures [=the Tales] are for grown-ups as well as children".  [Rethoric
Question:  If Mahler had wanted kids to sing, why then did he not write it
for kids?] The sung music gently vanishes in a smooth diminuendo, and with
that it foretakes the mood of the very last movement, which is a calm and
unbraced like the most careful sung lullaby.  The strings has the main
work here, and with their ingeniously fine playing, almost all sections
of the orchestra has proven to be superb players.  I think the New York
Philharmonics is at top quality in this recording, and it must be that
the conductor is very a inspiring with a deep affinity for his mission.
The music goes on.  Horns and tremolo strings build up a little climax
where the lesser broad tempo ends (2/4), and then we are back in tempo
I according to the score, but Bernstein takes it a little quicker, still
peaceful, although it looses somewhat of its lustre, but with the power is
kept, and that is very important as well.  This energy is accumulated to
build a crescendo of fateful spirit.  Although the last movement is long
(well 25 minutes in total duration) to balance the size of the earlier
movements, it is too often a long and windling road to do the work the last
movement is supposed to do; to tie the different parts together and leave
the finalcontribution to the emotional code of the work.  But Bernstein
keeps the energy throughout, and although the orchestra must be tired at
this point, he succeedes to draw great energy from them still, and the last
movement doesn't sound boring at all.  The emotional code in Mahler is very
important, and that is the main factor Bernstein is applying to, but he
shows throughout the building of the music to be a symphonist as well, who
understands how to connect the different themes with each other, for Mahler
can, in difference to Bruckner choose vastly different themes to work with,
and it could sometimes give the interpreter good challanges.  The last
crescendo so builds up steady, and the Demiurg is breathing through the
orchetstra, to heal everything with its "Athma", to keep live the ruler of
World, to give man something to set faith in - forever.

But all in all; Orfeus has tanmed the savage beasts!  Bernsteins result
with this symphony is outstanding, well according to his joy of doing
Mahlers third symphony again, yet better.  Deutsche Grammophon has made
a very wise choice in picking this recording up.  Zeus choosed the Eagle!
Be envious, other labels!

Mats Norrman
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